


Just a Few Changes

by themadmaiden



Series: Off the Rails [1]
Category: Portal (Video Game)
Genre: Aperture is a death trap, Cave Johnson was insane, Enemies to Friends, F/F, Insults, Pre-Slash, Sarcasm, or you know friendship shaped, wtf are emotions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-14
Updated: 2018-01-27
Packaged: 2019-03-04 13:53:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 29,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13366095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themadmaiden/pseuds/themadmaiden
Summary: A few simple changes, someone wakes up faster, a laugh slips through, little things and then suddenly everything goes off the rails.Chell's p.o.v throughout the games, things start to change at a certain point in the second one. Just a little bit, but enough to make a difference in the long run.





	1. Prologue: Aperture - Round One

**Author's Note:**

> This is a story I've had written for a while. It's part one of a series that I've yet to finish. But part one can be read by itself so I figured, why not....

The first time she went through Aperture’s test chambers, Chell knew she was being watched. She had to be. There were cameras everywhere and they followed her as she moved. There was even a test chamber to prove that they were watching her even after they said she wouldn’t be monitored. She could never see anyone in the glazed windows that dotted the walls of the test chambers though. So they must have been watching her solely through the cameras. The instructions however always came from what seemed like a prerecorded or automated voice in the ceiling, so she had no idea who was actually putting her through all this.

She actually...couldn’t remember. She couldn’t remember almost anything really. She knew her name, Chell, and that she _had_ been outside this place at some point. As well as a few other basic things. Things like the fact that she’s pretty sure she didn’t always have these weird knee braces stuck in or on her knees. And that being a test subject was something that she really shouldn’t have signed up for, if she even had. Nothing useful though.

She tried not to think about it. All she could do was solve the tests for whatever group was running this place. Scientists of some sort it seemed, possibly....no scratch that, probably insane. Who were ignoring her. Which was annoying. She was alone in the test chambers with an automated voice and that was it. Well two could play at that game, she wouldn’t talk either.

For a very short time, she had a cube that she could use to help her in the tests. It was just like all the others. Only with hearts on it, but she found some comfort in having something to help her. In fact she grew attached to it, to the point where she was upset with herself for burning it, and them for making her burn it. The comments from the prerecorded voice about it feeling pain certainly didn’t help with that. The voice had also started to say more and more disturbing things as she went on. She wondered if that was part of the tests or if the scientists were just creepier than she thought.

-

For a long time she hated the people she knew had to be behind this whole thing. Even more than the ever erratic voice that was giving her terrible instructions and making odd, dark monotone jokes and breaking down into static and sounding downright...evil at times. After all it was only doing what it was programmed to do or was possibly broken. It would be like hating the turrets who shot at her because, well they were turrets, just doing what they were built for.

It wasn’t until the attempted murder by fire pit and following meltdown from the voice that Chell had realized that she wasn’t dealing with a semi broken automated system or prerecorded messages run by a group of insane scientists somewhere, but an individual and most likely a machine that could think for itself....no, herself if that voice was anything to go by. The mentions of tests resulting in death weren’t coming from people who didn’t understand work and safety practices but from a machine that was using these test chambers as a way to try and kill her.

The weird graffiti she’d found suddenly made a lot more sense. She thought she’d just been being warned about the people behind the cameras and the person who’d made them just put she as....well a pronoun. But apparently Chell should have taken them a little more literally.

After that she felt even more alone and slightly.....slightly betrayed. She’d felt sorry for the clearly broken automated machine while she was going through what were clearly test chambers built by an insane company. Presuming inanimate objects as alive was apparently a side effect of testing according to the voice and that’s what she had been doing without even realizing it, lying voice aside. She’d been imagining the broken voice that was giving her directions was maybe a bit alive and if it was, was probably just as annoyed at the people running the place as she was. As it turned out, the inanimate object was more alive than anyone else in the building and that was because it had murdered everyone else inside. So at least she might have been right about one thing.

-

So she did what she had to do, she survived. She solved more puzzles and worked her way through the less than pristine underbelly of Aperture Science. There were clues and hints from someone who had been living in the walls, probably the same one with the shrine to the companion cube in the other hiding holes she’d found and the hints she’d misread. But she hadn’t seen the person and they could be dead as well for all she knew. She was still on her own.

Alone and yet with a voice taunting her personally now. It...she tried playing nice at the start. Though the voice wasn’t really good at it. Obvious lies about cake and parties were ignored. Also ignored were the taunts about her intelligence and as she reached the final chamber, the rest of the things thrown at her. Chell had no idea if she was an orphan, she didn’t care actually. She simply wasn’t going to die like this. The neurotoxin being pushed into the room and the rockets were far more important to pay attention to than being called a friendless loner who would not be mourned. Besides, she wasn’t going to die.

-

The giant A.I loomed above her as they fought. Yelling and insulting her and using everything she could to kill her.

 

“A bitter and terrible person-”

“I **HATE** YOU”

“I’m going to kill you... _and all the cake i_ _s_ _gone_.”

 

There was a lot of talking to drown out, but Chell was not going to give up here. Not when she was so close.

 

-

When she finally, finally silenced the bitter, hateful voice, she was caught up in the ensuing explosion that dragged her up to the surface.

In what was probably shock, she lay on the ground in the fresh air and the sunlight and she was completely alone. Totally alone this time. No more voice, no more cameras. Just her and the bright blue sky. Oh and the massive explosion behind her and the extreme pain that was making it impossible for her to get up right now. She was starting to think that one of those things connected to her knees might have been ripped out, but she couldn’t move to look. She didn’t really want to look.

As her vision faded in and out she saw some letters on the now still chassis of the machine she’d been fighting silently the entire time. G-L-a-D-O-S. Well GLaDOS, she said in her head, because talking seemed as impossible as moving at the moment. Sorry it had to come to this, but you really left me no choice.

Not that she’d say that to her if she could. Even after the A.I had thrown away the fake automated system trick and started talking directly to her, Chell had remained silent. Because being ignored was annoying and she was only returning the favour. Besides she didn’t want to talk to something that had tricked her. So she’d made up her mind and when she made up her mind on something important, it became near impossible to change it, she knew that about herself at least. Not that it mattered now though, the machine....GLaDOS was dead, for lack of a better word.

GLaDOS. Chell thought the name one more time before her tired, sore and bruised body start to give out again and she began to loose consciousness.

It was just then she realized that she and the empty chassis were no longer alone. Something had grabbed her and was dragging her backwards. Back towards the ruined building.

This time she did want to make noise. She wanted to scream and claw her hands on the ground to get a grip on something. Something to hold onto that would stop her from being dragged away from her long fought for freedom. However she was too exhausted and with the pain in her legs increasing by the dragging, and the bruised ribs and sore lungs, her vision soon went black and she was carted away from the wreck unconscious. She didn’t see the machine that did this, just as she didn’t see the machines that dragged the remains of GLaDOS back into the ruined facility and begin to rebuild behind them.

No, she was left alone once again, this time being put in a long term stasis chamber to heal. Not that she knew any of this. Just as she never learned that the man who lived in the walls, had been alive this entire time and had gone back inside, risking his life to ensure that she would survive in her second round of stasis.

It was a shame, she might have liked to know she had someone looking out for her survival besides herself, even if only for a little bit


	2. Chapter One: The Ruins

The next time, she woke up in a strange room. Again. This one was nicer then the small cramped cell like room with the clear walls she’d woken up in the first time though and there was a voice, but not _her_ voice. Chell was in a semi daze and simply followed the instructions as asked and then went back to sleep. Later she would kick herself for not trying to escape at that moment but as far as she could remember all she could think of was getting back to sleep. Maybe there was something in the air in the room. She wouldn’t put that past Aperture.

-

The second time she woke up, she woke up properly. Which wasn’t hard as this time there was pure chaos descending upon her. Sirens, a voice at the door and the fact that the room she was in looked like it had become a ruin overnight. Plants growing everywhere, a hardened outline of where she’d been laying down on the bed. There was even an automated voice that had given up at a disturbing _999999 ***static***_ days of stasis, which did not help either.

What she found also, really didn’t help, was the sphere she let into the room. It looked like one of _her_ cores, but wasn’t _her_ , which was the main reason why Chell played along with it...him. A bit. She still remembered her no talking rule so when asked to say something, she just jumped in the air. The Blue Sphere could underestimate her all he wanted to, that tended to work in her favour.

Meanwhile she soon started to regret not trying to escape from the room herself when she realized that he thought that hacking involved smashing the room, apparently a mobile room, into a wall to get through it.

She had to give him credit though, they did get through. Somehow still alive too.

 

He had no idea who she was apparently, as he thought he had to explain what a portal gun was to her. She almost laughed at that but managed to hold it in. At least this probably meant he hadn’t been working for GLaDOS. So she followed his slightly condescending instructions, they weren’t flat out insults, he just didn’t seem to know much better. Which was an improvement over the last voice telling her what to do.

 

The voice that actually freaked her out was the one that was a “backup” emergency voice that was running the test chambers she was working her way through to get back to the Blue Sphere with the portal gun. She’d thought that she...GLaDOS, had been a recording for most of her first time in the test chambers and look how that played out. So she listened very closely to the voice, waiting to find out if she was going to be tricked again.

It turned out however that was the least of her worries.

-

When she finally met up with the Blue Sphere again, he revealed that they were going to get out of Aperture, good plan, but to do that they had to go through _her_ room. A plan he seemed frankly terrified of. She knew who he meant instantly of course. If GLaDOS was running this place with other A.I around her, they would have all been terrified of her. This silly, slightly dim one most of all she’d assume. After all, she had never spoken and GLaDOS had enjoyed being sarcastic and insulting about anything she could think of when it came to her. And while cheerful and helpful in his own way, the Blue Sphere really...wasn’t always the brightest. She couldn’t imagine GLaDOS not taking advantage of that.

He did seem to think that there was a chance she was still alive though. Chell herself didn’t believe this at all. If there was even a remote chance that the A.I was online or working, Chell would have been either dead already or forced on the run far before she could have gotten close to this chamber. GLaDOS had seemed to hate her for simply not dying when she wanted her to in the tests and then Chell had killed her. In self defence of course, but somehow she didn’t think the A.I would see it that way.

So they made their way through the remains of a large room Chell remembered all too well. She was staring now, at the pieces littering the floor as the Blue Sphere talked about how no one knew who the man who did it was or where he’d gone. She didn’t bother to correct him. Her no speaking rule was still in effect but also it would feel...wrong here. The once sterile white room was a ruin of growing vines and greenery and littered with the remains of her once powerful enemy. It felt like a sacred place, a dangerous place, one that she wanted to get out of as soon as possible.

Luckily the Blue Sphere said he knew how they could escape. So after a few manoeuvres, where Chell mentally thanked whoever or most likely, whatever had replaced her knee surgery things with boots that seemed to do the same thing but with less bare feet, they managed to locate what was apparently the way out. Or the Blue Sphere said was the route to the way out. Some sort of escape pod.

There were a lot of switches, and Chell got a bad feeling the moment she put the Blue Sphere in and he sounded sure and then suddenly unsure of himself. She got a worse feeling as the platform they were on started to move up, flipping up all the switches on the way and the sphere tried to pretend he wasn’t panicking. And then it went faster.

What kept her rooted in fear however was the voice that awaited them when they reached the top.

_“Power Up Initiated."_   Well at least she’d been wrong about that voice, it really was just a recording and now really, really was the least of her worries.

Ignoring the Sphere as it blurted out how it could fix this, trying stupid password after stupid password; she watched in horror as something close to what her nightmares would have been like if she’d had them in stasis began.

Bursts of blue power and moving steel and metal noises began to fill the room as the pieces of the machine once laying on the floor in front of them in a heap, began to pull themselves together.

This couldn’t be happening. There had been an explosion. She’d watched her die....She was thinking this, frozen still in place as the Blue Sphere gave up on his ‘hacking attempts’. He was now frantically telling her to act natural, while the actual recording reported that the power up was now complete.

Chell stared up into the one eyed machine, not fully fixed, bits still hanging from odd angles but the yellow light was there and staring right at her.

“Oh it’s _you._ ”

The Blue Sphere was still trying to talk but it was clear that GLaDOS was paying sole attention to her, and only her.

“It’s been a long time. How have you been?”

“What, you know her?” Chell wasn’t sure who the sphere was asking but it didn’t matter. She remained silent to both of them.

“I’ve been really busy being dead. You know after you **Murdered Me**.”

“You did what?...wait, that was you?”

Passive aggressiveness, at least that was familiar. Terrifyingly familiar. She wished the Blue Sphere would be quiet. She wished she had some place to run. Her instincts were screaming to get out and get out now, but thanks to the set up they were in there was no way to try and get anywhere.

Not that this would have done anything if she had tried. Moments after calling her a murderer, GLaDOS got the jump on her for once. Pulling both her and the sphere up in metal claws that came down too fast to dodge, Chell dropped the Portal gun and could barely move as she was held in the air. She was the lucky one though, as while GLaDOS stared at her, she simply used the claw that the Blue Sphere was in to smash him and send him flying, now silent, off to the side. Chell couldn’t even see if he was still alive.

She tried to break free at this point but she was moving high in the air now as well, as GLaDOS continued to talk to her. She didn’t believe a word of ‘putting their differences behind them for science’ of course, especially as this was followed up by being called a monster.

However she had more pressing worries as she was being moved towards a very familiar looking hole jutting out of the floor...the incinerator. GLaDOS’ tone was dry, ominous and so very smug.

“I will say though since you went through all that trouble of waking me up, you must really, really love to test. I love it too. There’s just one little thing we need to take care of first.”

Love to test was either code for revenge murder by fire or there was more going on. She wasn’t sure which one she’d rather it be. She didn’t have any choice in the matter though as GLaDOS let go of her and she fell, still silent as she refused to scream, down the incinerator chute.


	3. Chapter Two: Aperture - Round Two

Chell had no idea how she survived the fall. At points she almost got squished but the boots she was wearing were good and she managed to land on her feet even after a fall of that height. Then GLaDOS spoke up and it was clear that option one, death by incinerator hadn’t been the plan after all. It was to be insults, passive aggressive statements and orders to find the duel portal gun so they could resume testing.

She wasn’t sure what to make of this, GLaDOS must want her dead. But maybe she wanted to torture her and insult her first, in tests? She didn’t know, she really didn’t know anything about the A.I aside from the fact that the machine hated her even more now.

Taking a deep breath, then regretting it as she was in an overly hot furnace, Chell moved foreword. If it was testing the A.I wanted it was testing she would get and just like last time, Chell would escape. This time for good.

-

This was easier said then done though and the A.I was now even more vindictive and insulting now that she had things to fixate on. Gone were the days of pretending to be a prerecorded message. Now whatever she wanted to say, she said over the speakers right to Chell. Insults, veiled threats, possible lies and obvious lies. There was no use trying to work them all out in her head. The chambers were harder then the old ones now and she needed to think of a way to get out so she mostly ignored anything that didn’t sound like instructions.

....So most of it.

To her great, great surprise however, it turned out that she wasn’t as alone as she thought. Somehow the Blue Sphere had also survived and said he was working on a plan to bust them out. She just had to keep testing. The Sphere was hardly the most encouraging support at a time like this, but she’d take any help she could get to escape.

\--

So she continued to solve the tests, ignoring the less and less veiled threats as she went along. Ignoring the less and less subtle insults as well. GLaDOS was apparently many things, and petty and spiteful were ones that could be safely added to the list. Destroying companion cubes in front of her for the pure enjoyment of it and honestly who actually used fat as an insult?

Meanwhile she kept getting sightings and updates from the sphere. Some of them weren’t very reassuring, but her own attempts to find escape routes were coming to nothing and she was starting to believe she would feel bad if she found a way out without him. He was trying to help her. The last help she could remember getting was from whoever left those scrawled notes on the walls in the hidden rooms of the old test chambers and she had never met them.

As the tests continued, the chambers around her start taking on more and more clean and sterile forms. The amount of control the A.I has was steadily growing over the entire facility as they moved from test chamber to test chamber. It was unsettling, so Chell ignored it and continued to work on the thing she could control. Staying alive.

 

When the Blue Sphere actually comes through on his plans and helps her break out she can hardly believe it. However she’s never one to pass up a chance for freedom and she makes a run for it, GLaDOS yelling at them as they run out.

It’s tricky, GLaDOS is literally bringing the place down around them as they run. Traps with turrets, offers of freedom, anything and everything is tried to keep them from moving forward but somehow they get through it all alive.

-

Entering a part of the facility where GLaDOS has little control is exhilarating, especially when the sphere says he knows what they have to do next. And his ideas are actually good, though a bit vague as to how they’re going to get them to work. Luckily he knows the where and once they reach them, Chell manages to figure out the how. After all it’s just another puzzle.

So they sabotage the neurotoxin and the turrets without being noticed and return to face GLaDOS on more even terms for once.


	4. Chapter Three: Mistakes Were Made

Chell isn’t sure why she’s surprised when everything goes wrong.

It worked fine at first, even though she and the Blue Sphere are separated before arriving. GLaDOS thought she’d gotten her in an easy trap, obvious fake door and everything and was ready to kill her off. Being slid into an empty room with the newly rebuilt A.I above her, gloating about how she’s going to die soon isn’t the most calming moment of her life. But the turrets that arrive are broken, just as planned and soon after that the neurotoxin doesn’t show up at all.

In fact it’s all that Chell can do to keep from smiling as GLaDOS gets more and irritated. There’s sheer annoyance in the A.I’s tones about what she’s managed to do but it doesn’t matter. Especially when the Blue Sphere shows up, falling from the broken tube and the recorded voice suddenly starts talking about corruption and something called a core transfer.

Putting the Blue Sphere in the new receptacle is easy enough but apparently both cores have to agree and GLaDOS, actually sounding scared for once, refuses. Which apparently means there was a stalemate that had to be solved.

By pushing a button. Because Aperture.

However Chell has to work to get over to the button as GLaDOS uses the floor panels to fling her away from it. She’s underestimated again though and using the portal gun to get there, Chell presses the red button.

And everything starts to go insane.

-

Running over she almost flinched as she looked on, GLaDOS was suddenly hanging limp as her control was apparently now stripped away from her and the Blue Sphere starts to worry about if this is going to hurt.

“Oh it will...believe me, it will.”

Somehow GLaDOS can still talk, though she looks dead in the chassis.

Wheatley is dragged under and she heard his yell of pain. However her eyes were stuck on GLaDOS as arm like appendages came up from underneath the A.I and started to, well rip is the only word she can think of, rip her out of the giant machine Chell had always associated her with.

GLaDOS tried to fight back but can’t and Chell can only watch as the A.I who wanted her dead mere minutes ago screamed until the sound turned shrill and inhuman, and finally went silent as what was clearly her main sphere, head, core? Is tossed aside like garbage. Chell should be pleased or at least relieved but that scream won’t leave her head and she feels sick.

-

Everything lights up now though as the Blue Sphere rising out of the chamber below is suddenly in control of the giant chassis. It looks a bit weird but he’s thrilled at this, apparently he now has full control of the entire facility. Good news for once it seems.

“Look what we’ve done, partner.”

Distracted by everything he can seemingly now do, he does remember the original plan and calls up an elevator from the floor like it’s nothing.

-

Looking back later, she realizes she should have noticed the first warning signs, when he mentions how tiny she is down there compared to him. How excited he seems to be to be in power. Or even looking further back, the things he said when they were working together. Maybe she’d been so used to GLaDOS’ overt insults, she hadn’t really taken seriously the ones her supposed ‘partner’ was accidentally using on her. Like the brain damage comments and the insults about humans that were hastily apologized about after but then used again in the future. She won’t know how she missed them but you can’t change the past and at this point she still trusts him.

-

As she got into the elevator, making sure not to look at GLaDOS, the sphere was still going on about how amazing it is to be in power. Making confetti appear, cubes pop out and then said something in Spanish about not using the translation software properly and to consult a manual, for some reason.

He started the elevator up, but worry in the pit of her stomach suddenly started to build because he was still talking about how small she was and how big he is. And then....came the laughter. The moment he laughed she knew what was going to happen. Even the “well actually” and the elevator starting to lower back down only confirm it to her.

She was being betrayed. Again. Only this time it’s not to something she thought was a prerecorded voice or a group of mad scientists that didn’t really exist.

He was going on about how she had no idea how good this feels and how he did everything. Lies again. She should be used to dealing with lies after GLaDOS but this hurt because he was there, praised their work together, called them a team mere minutes ago. She did learn his name though. Wheatley. The blue sphere she trusted and carried around and put in control was now turning on her. And once again she’s trapped.

And once again, GLaDOS makes things worse.

The voice that came from the floor made her move back a bit, because she thought the A.I had to be dead after all that. But she was not. The voice is weak and tired, but defiant. And if the results were different Chell might actually be happy at that.

But what GLaDOS said is the truth and the truth was the last thing Wheatley wanted to hear.

“You didn’t do anything. She did all the work.”

It figures the first time GLaDOS actually praised her, it was in a way that damned her as well.

Because Wheatley was apparently that disloyal, or gullible or stupid that he completely turned on her as soon as those words were uttered. If he hadn’t been in the middle of doing that anyway. Maybe this just gave him more lines to throw at her.

“That’s what the two of you think, is it?”, he said, as though they hadn’t been just working against GLaDOS minutes ago. As if GLaDOS hadn’t just been trying to kill her minutes ago.

He grabbed a hold of GLaDOS and dragged her back down into the pit of mechanical arms and she was screaming again. Not that he seemed to pay that much attention to the other A.I as he was now paying far too much attention to Chell and she was trapped in a glass elevator, unable to do anything.

She tried to ignore him. His accusations of him doing all the work, her bossing him around and not sacrificing anything to get them there. He’s shown his true colours now and she was determined to ignore his insults just as as she did with GLaDOS’. What does still hurt is the betrayal and she hated that more than anything.

She was also worried about GLaDOS, mostly because she doesn’t know what’s going on under the floor. GLaDOS only spoke up to turn things against Chell, she’s sure of that. But she can’t forget the screams or the defiant tone the A.I used even when helpless on the ground. It was the opposite of Chell’s defiant muteness, but she can somewhat respect that.

So when the floor opened up to pull out a potato battery, Chell just stared. A toy for children he said, that’s where she lives. Chell almost doesn’t believe the living part until a hissing noise and a small light flickered on the tiny vegetable and the metal parts of it.

She would recognize that voice anywhere even in its current tiny voice. It doesn’t speak to her though.

“I know you.”

Chell was as far back as she could get in the elevator as the two argue about who remembers what.

GLaDOS mentioned the cores and Chell remembered the ones she pulled from her in the past. They all seemed to have some affect on the A.I. The one in front of her now, was an intelligence dampening sphere?

Wheatley seems to disagree. Violently in fact. He’s smashed GLaDOS into the glass of the elevator as she continues to yell at him from her tiny potato battery. Chell tries to move back further but there’s no way out and she shields her face with her arms to avoid the glass shards. Luckily most of them seem to be flying to the side but she can feel some sting as they hit her arms.

“You’re the moron they made to make me an idiot!” GLaDOS yells.

With that Wheatley smashes a hole in the elevator and drops the potato GLaDOS at Chell’s feet. He’s out of control now. Yelling at them about how he’s not a moron. Even if she did break her no talking rule and try to say something, it would probably would just make things worse or not be heard at all. Because now he’s smashing the elevator down into the shaft while yelling at them.

“Can a moron smash you into this pit?”

GLaDOS is silent and for once Chell really wished she wasn't, because she needed someone to say. Yes, because you’re doing it right now! But then the bottom goes out beneath them and she didn’t even have a moment to try and grab for the sides or the potato or anything before she started to fall.


	5. Chapter Four: Down the Rabbit Hole

So all in all, it went pretty terribly. 

She wasn’t dead though which was at least something. However she was currently falling down a long, long hole in the ground and she wasn’t sure if even the boots she had on would be able to save her if she ever landed. 

“Oh, hi.”

And then the other falling object, person, A.I in the pit speaks up and starts making casual conversation.

“So. How are you holding up? ...Because I’m a potato!”

Everything is insane. It turns out GLaDOS can still talk, even after being thrown through glass. Chell can even see her a bit if she looks down. She then hears what sounds like....slow clapping.

She’s pretty sure potatoes don’t have hands but that’s cleared up a moment later when GLaDOS continues talking. Reverting back to her casual, isn’t this just so normal for us tone.

“Oh good, my slow clap processor made it into this thing, so we have that.”

And it’s either the tone, the insanity that has lead up to this, maybe the stress finally getting to her or just everything combined that causes Chell to break her silence. Slightly and without meaning to and really it’s not like she’s talking.... 

What she does is laugh. Just laughs at everything; because her entire life is a joke. She’s still trapped in Aperture, been betrayed, and is falling down a bottomless pit with her former worst enemy trapped in a potato, who is now making jokes. She’d probably laugh harder if it wasn’t for the falling part.

This however makes GLaDOS go completely silent. Even after Chell lets her laughter drift off, the potato doesn’t say a word. For a moment Chell wonders if she has lost her mind and was just imagining it talking but then GLaDOS speaks up again.

“Well that was....disturbing. You refuse to speak but you laugh while we’re falling to our deaths? Maybe you do have brain damage.” 

This hits a little too close to what Wheatley says that she almost responds. Almost, but doesn’t. Lips sealing tight. It was stupid to laugh in front of GLaDOS but she’s not going to give any more then that. 

GLaDOS waits a little while longer and then apparently decides she might as well fill her in on what exactly Chell has just put in charge of the facility. No mention is made of the fact that she was going to kill Chell mere minutes before that, but it’s almost reassuring. GLaDOS never believes she’s done anything wrong. At least some things haven’t changed.

What has changed is now a sphere that was designed to not only be dumb, but the dumbest moron who ever lived is in charge Aperture. The sad thing is she doesn’t even think GLaDOS is lying to her. Maybe exaggerating a bit but it does explain a few things. Like Wheatley’s “hacking” abilities and how she really did have to do all of the actual work, but that doesn’t really help either of them right now as they continue to fall. 

GLaDOS mentions that if the pit isn’t totally bottomless then maybe Chell could give her one of her long fall boots and try to land on one foot. She doesn’t of course, even if that was even possible for her to reach down and do. 

It turns out GLaDOS is right about one thing though, it’s not bottomless and they crash down onto wooden boards that are somehow blocking the way. Chell lands on her feet but that just smashes her further down. And while she does attempt to make a grab for the potato beneath her, she meets the ground soon after that and is knocked unconscious, not aware of whether or not she managed to grab a hold of the battery or not.


	6. Chapter Five: End of the Line

Her head hurts as she wakes up this time. Vision swimming in and out as she stares up from her location on the ground. Her ears are still ringing from the sudden crash landing and so everything is a haze of confusion

After a few moments of shock, she forces herself to get up. Carefully she stretches out her arms and legs, trying to make sure she’s not more injured then she seems. Nothing seemed to be broken or badly injured though, just sore and shaken up. What are apparently her long fall boots are still on. Which is good, there’s probably more falls around; though hopefully none as long as that one. Even after everything she’s lived through it still seems somewhat impossible she’d really just survived a fall from that height.

Meanwhile her vision is starting to clear up and adjust to the darkness she’s found herself in. It is very dark and the only light is coming from a fire off in the distance. She’s somewhere far, far underground that’s for sure; since Aperture itself was underground to begin with. So probably too far down to just easily find an exit and get out while she could. Too bad. She’d have to find a way up then. It’s chilly and damp down here though, so she unties the top of her jumpsuit, pulls the top half back on over her tank-top and does it up. Much better.

She takes another look around to get a bearing on what’s around her. Now that her ears have stopped ringing she hears what sounds like a bird....and something like static? Glancing over she sees a bird sitting on top of a beam. It’s pecking at something. A potato?

Right, GLaDOS. Before the bird can do anything else, and before she can really think of what she’s doing, Chell lunges forward and grabs the silent potato. The bird caws at her and makes a lunge at her hand but she jumps back before it can do anything else and after waving her other hand at it, it eventually gets the message and flies off, still making a racket but gone.

Okay she now has one possibly dead A.I in potato form. She stares at it for a few moments but there’s still no talking. No, anything. For all she knows the A.I is gone forever. After all it was only a small potato battery. Now one that has been pecked at by a bird. Besides even if GLaDOS was somehow still in there, after all she had put her through she’d be well within her right to toss her aside or just leave her for the bird to come back to.

Somehow that doesn’t feel right though. So, not really sure what else to do with it, she puts it in the upper pocket of her jumpsuit.

“Guess it’s just the two of us.”

Her voice is hoarse and scratchy from lack of use. But she’s alone now. A.I out cold in her pocket or dead and no cameras to catch her. She doesn’t like talking much, but just once to make sure she still can makes her feel a bit better about things.

That behind her she begins to look around for anything else that might have fallen with them.

To her surprise the portal gun also seems to have survived the fall. She picks it up and tests it a bit to make sure it’s still working. It seems to be fine, so all there is now is to pick which direction to head towards. The elevator they came down in might be broken now, but there might be others that are still working down here.

-

It isn’t that easy though and she finds she has to use the portal gun to traverse the ruins of what seems to be long abandoned areas of Aperture Science. Probably, right now all she can find is ruins and a lot of Keep Out signs. When she gets to the giant wall with Condemned Testing Area she’s positive though and the name at the bottom of the signs just confirms it. There’s lots of signs that warn of dangers behind the wall, like Cosmic Ray Spallation Elements....whatever that meant. What unnerves her the most is the condemned sign’s date, 1961. She has a feeling that was a long time ago even during the first time she’d woken up here.

Chell pushes forward anyway. She has nowhere else to go and she’s not giving up on escaping now just because of unknown dangers in a condemned testing facility. She’d promised herself she was going to escape after all.

The giant vault door makes her pause slightly. If only for the sheer size of it but when she lines the portals up and opens it, there’s only a tiny little door on a giant empty wall and she almost laughs again because if this isn’t pure Aperture, nothing is. Instead she checks on the potato, now in her lower pocket as she was worried about dropping it.

Still nothing. So she continues.

There’s rumbling coming from above as she gets into an area filled with rusty metal walkways and what looks like the toxic water from what feels like countless test chambers ages ago. It’s familiar at least. What she finds as she gets past doors and flips a switch to turn some power on isn’t. Or at least part of it isn’t.

The power triggers lights to reveal a giant Aperture sign that looks older then any she’s seen above. It also triggers a prerecorded greeting from the founder of the facility. He’s talking about astronauts and war heroes and jokes about his secretary Caroline. It’s short and she doesn’t know what to make of it so she just starts to try to figure out a way to get to what looks like a walkway with a door out. It is of course not in an easily reachable place and so she goes back to work.

-

Luckily it’s not a very hard one to figure out and Chell soon finds herself high on some metal beams peering down at tiles on the ground. She’s trying to figure out whether to fire her entry portal now or wait till she’s jumping down to do it. This decision making however is interrupted when her pocket starts to scream. Stumbling, she loses her footing and falls off her perch. Thankfully, the boots do their job and she lands safely on her feet, only a bit shaken. Letting the portal gun go in one hand she uses the other to pull the now awake potato battery out of her pocket.

“Bird, bird! Get away from me you....” The voice stops and Chell just stares down at the potato, the light is on now and the yellow glow shines up at her.

“You.” The voice is more confused then accusatory which is fairly new. “But you were unconscious.... No wait, it doesn’t matter. What happened to that horrible monster? It was trying to to eat me!” There’s a pause and the voice turns hopeful. “Did you kill it? You like killing things, please tell me you killed it.”

For a moment Chell isn’t sure what to do. This seems different then ignoring the omnipresent voice in the ceiling. But she’d made a decision and she hated to go back on those. No talking.

So she shakes her head.

“Of course not, why would you do something- something...wait did you just _***_ ” The static rushes in again and the light dully goes out. Huh.

Putting the potato, now clearly still GLaDOS, back into her pocket she goes back to her previous task and soon flies through the air to land on the metal walkway that leads to an entrance hall of some sort. She almost drops the potato from her pocket in the flight though which is going to be a problem. This place looks like it’s going to need her full attention.

-

Wherever she'd found herself, it was fancy and had a door to offices to the sides. Maybe the first Aperture Science if they’d reached that far down. The prerecorded message that played informed her that this is where those prized athletes and war heroes and astronauts were going to test. It also mentioned something about Mantis Men, which was more then a little disturbing. Before, she had wondered how low they had fallen from famous people to people like her, she’s not sure what she is, but she has a feeling it’s nowhere in that sort of fame bracket; but now she’s just glad that she didn’t have to fight whatever Mantis Men were. The turrets were dangerous enough.

There’s a small seating section and Chell went to sit down in one of the dusty chairs. She took a moment to enjoy it. It felt like forever since she’d sat on anything actually soft. Even the stasis bed had been pretty hard, though admittedly the unknown amount of time that had passed during her “rest” might have affected that.

After a moment she pulled out the GLaDOS potato and looked at her Portal gun. This might work, or it might end horribly for one of them. Either way, she’s a risk taker. So she stabbed the potato on the end of the portal device. Firmly in place and out of the way of the portals being shot. There, that should hold...

“You were....what am I doing on this, this thing!” GLaDOS flickered back to life. “Did you stab me, you....wow wow wait, the gun must be part magnesium, I think I just got an extra half a volt.” The A.I actually sounded a bit excited at this. It made some sort of sense, Chell didn’t really know what being at such a low power was like for an A.I. To be honest she still didn’t really get how just a potato battery was running something as big as GLaDOS had always seemed.

“Look you took me with you, I don’t know why but I---” GLaDOS had started to talk but stopped, not this time because she’d fizzled out again but because she was apparently distracted. “That picture, over there in the display. Go over there, I need to see it.”

Chell frowned but got up and walked over to where a large picture was. Cave Johnson, Founder of Aperture Science, the plaque said. It must have been his voice she’d heard recently. GLaDOS said nothing but the light was on so she was still there.

“Cave Johnson....I know that name.” The A.I seemed to be musing more to herself then to Chell. “I know that face....I just can’t remember...who is that! _***_ ” This time she did fizzle out. Chell stayed still another moment, mostly because she was reading the articles and awards inside the displays. They didn’t seem that prestigious to her, especially all the second place trophies, or the one about a shower curtain. The potato one made her smile a bit though.

Once she finished reading she realized that GLaDOS was still out so she made her way towards what was apparently an old fashioned test chamber. Something to do with a gel, she remembered from the recording. Hopefully they weren't as dangerous as the more modern ones.

 


	7. Chapter Six: Dangerous Testing Areas

Of course they were just as dangerous as the more modern test chambers. Even more dangerous in parts because the walkways between the tests had fallen, sometimes literally, out of use and she found herself sometimes spending more of her concentration on making it to the next chamber then solving the official test itself. The recordings didn’t help either. From what she’d learned, the guy who ran this place in the past was insane. Proper mad scientist insane and she was going to be lucky if she survived this place without tumours or asbestos poisoning or who knows what else. Those ideas she firmly shoves to the back of her mind as things that could be thought over once she had escaped. She had been right about this place needing all her attention.

GLaDOS, seemed to realize that as well as even when she snapped back on in a confused haze, she remained fairly quiet save for some muttering at the announcements, until they reached a safe area to stand. Well safe-ish, the rumbling from above was still shaking things and Chell had to hold onto something to stay still.

“Look, we need to talk.” GLaDOS spoke up as the shaking subsided. “I still don’t know what the deal is with that man but that’s not important right now. Like I started to say, I don’t know why you brought me with you but I want to offer you a deal.”

Oh, this was going to be interesting. Chell stayed silent but waited.

“You can feel those tremors can’t you? That moron has no idea what he’s doing up there. He’s going to destroy the entire place if someone doesn’t disconnect him. I can’t do it alone and you can’t replace him. It needs to be me put back in control. Do it and....I’ll let you go. No more testing, no death threats, nothing. I promise.”

Chell stared down at GLaDOS, remaining silent.

“Really, we have no other options, it’s either stay down here and wait for death or go up there and find a way to fix this. Look, I know we’ve had a lot of moments in the past antagonizing each other and yes maybe sometimes things went too far but right now, we are _in a lot of trouble._ ”

The tone GLaDOS was using was what did it. She sounded serious, she sounded scared and a part of her even sounded a bit apologetic. Which meant the world was ending, or at least the part of the world GLaDOS cared about.

“Just nod or shake your head. Just something.” GLaDOS sounded more worried at the silence. “I can help, I don’t seem to know much about the areas down here but I can start planning what to do when we get back up there. Or if I see something down here that I recognize I’ll mention it. Once we get back we’ll have to work together anyway. Then I promise you can go. Just put me back in my body and I will let you go outside, no vague threats, no metaphors for death. Just out of the building, alive.”

Now there were two main goals Chell had acquired ever since waking up the first time in Aperture. Don’t die and, get out. Even if the A.I was lying, it was better to risk betrayal again then to just wait down here for death or go up there alone and explode. So she made sure she was looking at the potato and she nodded.

“Oh, wow I didn’t think you’d actually....I mean good. We’ll have to solve these test chambers to make our way to a working elevator. Then we get up there and fry that little metal tin can that thinks he can destroy my- _***_ ”

Apparently the emotional outburst or maybe just the long conversation was too much and GLaDOS fizzled out again. Well then, GLaDOS could be being honest now and then turn on her later like Wheatley did but she’d have to get them there first to find out. If she was betrayed again she’d just have to figure out what to do when it happened. A part of her, a small part, really hoped she didn’t have to. GLaDOS turning on her the first time she woke up in Aperture hadn’t hurt much, because she’d only thought of her as a prerecorded voice until almost the very end. Even with all the insults, it hadn’t felt much like a betrayal. It was more like a continuation of the insanity she’d woken into. After all, you had to have someone’s trust in the first place to betray them.

Wheatley however she _had_ trusted. Had helped and she was repaid by being insulted then thrown down a pit. That had hurt. Now she was going to have to offer GLaDOS some trust and help. What happened after that, they’d just have to see. It wasn’t thought she had much of a choice really. So with that decided, Chell then filed the potential for betrayal away with the rest of the things to think about later if they happened.

-

What happened almost immediately after that was a jump into the future. At least in terms of decor and year the facility was open There was a new less prestigious looking waiting area. Also less prestigious testing subjects if the prerecorded voice of the now annoyingly familiar Cave Johnson were to go by. GLaDOS was still out due to her anger about Wheatley so she missed hearing about the missing astronaut senate case and Cave Johnson being interrupted by his secretary when he started to go on a rant about someone or something called Black Mesa.

Chell was now at least satisfied to know that she had been right that Aperture had been built by insane people. Rude ones too, apparently homeless people off the street could come in and earn $60 dollars to basically be....test subjects. She really hoped that wasn’t how she ended up in Aperture but she couldn’t really write it off. She then reminded herself that it didn’t mater how she got there, what mattered was getting out.

GLaDOS was back online when they went into the first new test chamber. Chell could hear her muttering something about morons, but apparently not at a level that would short her out. Hopefully GLaDOS was actually coming up with a plan besides just insulting the other A.I.

As Chell looked around to see where she was going to have to start, the prerecorded messages started up again. This time Cave Johnson asked someone else a question in the prerecording and while Chell recognized the next voice as Caroline, GLaDOS’ reacted quite differently. In fact she replied to the question at the same time as the woman. With the exact same words.

“ _Yes sir.... Mr. Johnson.”_

She sounded half asleep as she talked over the woman. Chell froze and stared down at her, glad she hadn’t started to try anything before the message was over. She was a lot calmer then GLaDOS was once the A.I seemed to snap out of it though.

“What was that, who...what the hell is going _**_ ”

Now that had certainly been a bad enough emotional outburst to knock her out again. At this point Chell had stopped worrying if GLaDOS was going to stop coming back from these episodes, and so went to work on the new test. New gels, new tests, new highly broken test chamber routes to try and get to. She wasn’t sure what had happened to GLaDOS and she was a bit curious about the strange voice she was reacting to, but that could wait till they got out.

-

It certainly could wait because with the addition of a new gel the tests became all the harder. She wasn’t sure if she was a fan of this gel stuff. If only because she was getting covered in it. At least the adrenaline and satisfaction she got from solving the tests was still there.

After the first test GLaDOS manages to snap back on.

“Well I think we can safely say by now that emotional outbursts require more then one point six volts. Which means we’ll just have to figure out all of this....calmly.”

Chell isn’t sure if that’s possible for the A.I but as always she stays silent. However she notices something above them, a room of some sort with a wall that looks like it might fit a portal. Deciding to see if there’s a way maybe past a test chamber or two she shoots a blue portal up in the room.

“Wait, what are you?” GLaDOS is too late to question as the other portal is already shot in a nearby wall and she walks through it into what appears to be an office. An office with no other door, much to her annoyance. However GLaDOS seems more concerned with something else.

“Those people.”

Chell glances to the side and sees a giant portrait of two people. One she knows, it has the name of the bottom and looks just like the previous portrait. The other she’s not so sure.

“They look....so familiar....” GLaDOS is still musing. “I swear...I know him. And her.....Caroline, Caroline. How do I know her?”

Chell looks in confusion first at the painting, then GLaDOS and then back to the painting. The name Caroline isn’t there at all but maybe GLaDOS is remembering something?

She waits a minute, looking around the rest of the room but GLaDOS doesn’t say anything else and she doesn’t say anything as Chell turns to leave the room. No bypassing test chambers here it seems, just more mysteries.

Well at least there’s always test chambers. She’d rather face one of those then a memory based mystery any day. St least with her own she’s able to just push to the side and ignore. She passes through the older version of the weird emancipation grills and on to the next test. She’s going to put all her thoughts into solving this and only this.


	8. Chapter Seven: Thoughts From a Potato

GLaDOS remains quiet as the test subject continues to defy more and more odds by solving test chambers in this broken down mess of a facility’s ruins. She has thinking, plotting to do but she can’t help but notice what it’s like to be on the other end of the testing for once. Everything goes by so quickly for one. The danger is also more obvious when you’re stuck on the end of the actual portal device.

If her own life wasn’t also in danger she might enjoy watching the test subject nearly die in these difficult tests but now she’s....pleased when the test subject just continues solving them. If the woman fails at first, she simply gets up as as if nothing has happened and tries over and over until she manages to get a solution that gets her to where she needs to be. Working her way around everything thrown at her. GLaDOS hates to praise the woman in any way, but she has to admit it’s rather impressive. It’s a shame she can’t record this. For scientific purposes of course.

She starts to ignore their surroundings after realizing that the test subjects is just as stubborn as ever and doesn’t need her help. Even if she did know enough about these test chambers to give any. Instead she gets lost in thought, half of it devoted to trying to think of what they’re going to do when they get up to Aperture to confront the moron with control of her facility and half in thoughts of how does she know that mysterious Caroline person? Unfortunately, the second one seems to be getting most of the juice because it’s the only one she feels she’s getting closer to an answer for. Now she just has to remain calm and everything should go well.

This turns out to be easier thought then done. After the last test chamber, as the test subject takes them outside on more precarious metal walkways, she’s ripped out of her thoughts by a terrifying familiar noise.

“Bird, bird! Kill it!” Her response happens without even thinking. The bird is sitting on the railing of the walkway in front of them. It’s come back to eat her, she just knows it. “Kill it, it’s evil _***_ ” Her fear is so great that she hears herself fizzling out again.

However she comes back in what feels like seconds later. The bird is still watching her but she remains silent and then realizes that the portal gun she’s on is being held in one hand which is why everything is so strange and sideways. It must have been more then two seconds she was out.

She can still see though and she sees the test subject using her free hand to wave at the bird. Trying to get it to go away? She’s almost ready to say something when she hears....

“Shoo, go away. No A.I potato for you.”

She....spoke. The test subject spoke. She almost fizzles out at just that because this can’t be happening. First a nod and then,....the woman clearly must think she was still out. It’s the only reason if she’s been staying this silent and now. But why was she- _***_....her sudden frantic thoughts are too much and she crashes again.

-

The next thing she knows is that the bird is flying off and she’s back in two hands.

“Oh it’s flown away. Good.....For it.” She’s not going to bring up sudden talking thing. Mostly because she doesn’t know what to make of it yet. It means she’s been ignored this entire time which is infuriating and annoying and just proves more what a terrible person her test subject is. She only spoke when she thought she couldn’t hear her after all.

But at the same time. She did shoo that bird away, and looking back to when they’d fallen down that elevator shaft. GLaDOS had somehow gone from being bird food to being tucked away in a jumpsuit pocket. Clearly something had happened while she’d been out. And she was starting to think she knew what it was.

Had...the test subject saved her? Without even the deal of freedom on the table? Either the woman was insane or just...... Her thoughts trail off there. There’s something bothering her with how she’s been thinking lately. She remembers the voices from the cores they hung on her and now it seems like there’s....another one in with her. Somehow. Only this one is more familiar, quieter.

Her thoughts break up and she realizes they’re in a new area and the test subject is turning on a new gel. Conversion gel, that does bring something back, and that name comes with it.

“Caroline....” She’s musing out loud now, the safe things to say. “Maybe I killed her....”

And then it clicks into her head and suddenly everything makes terrible, terrible sense.

“Oh my god.” No this can’t be. “Look.” She doesn’t expect her to but the test subject looks down at her. “You’re doing a great job with the tests. I just...can you handle this by yourself for a while? I need to think.”

And once again her test subject nods. She makes a note of that as she dives back into memories and thoughts and tries to make sense of what she’s feeling and remembering.


	9. Chapter Eight: More Tests

Being thanked by GLaDOS is strange but the A.I seemed so shaken up Chell just nodded when asked if she could handle the rest of the testing by herself. To be honest she’d been doing most of it by herself but then again that’s what she was good at. Besides whatever was driving GLaDOS crazy about this women Caroline, it would probably be better if she could clear it up before they had to go and face off against Wheatley.

Not that she didn’t think she couldn’t beat him alone, she’d already beaten GLaDOS twice. But having help would be nice, even nicer if it didn’t end in a swift betrayal.

Nope, not thinking about that. She’d deal with everything later. When she had to. Now she has three gels to deal with. The white one is slightly disturbing especially when a clearly older Cave Johnson recording came on. They were getting closer to the surface, apparently at this point in time test subjects were being drawn from the employees. Chell was pretty sure that wasn’t how she got in, or at least GLaDOS should have known about her if it was.

Anyway, this Cave Johnson sounded, sick. Apparently the conversion gel was made from ground up moon rocks? Which was poison. Everything was poisoned here it seemed but it was one thing to be warned by voices and another to hear what sounded like a man dying from it.

She wanted to just push away her fears of what might be getting into her body from this place but it was getting harder and harder to just keep pushing everything she can’t think about right now to the future. She ends up taking a moment to look at the warning signs. Apparently GLaDOS notices.

“Look, we’re running out of time. If you’re worried about what Mr. Johnson...I mean that nutty old man is saying, I’ll run some tests on you before I kick you out. Okay? Now can we please move on?”

That was the more familiar GLaDOS she was used to, slightly. The offer of help was new but it could just be because she was going to kill her off. That however just reminded her of what she needed to be focusing on. Getting out, and if that meant deadly moon gel, then well she’d have to figure out what to do later.

-

It involved a lot of deadly moon gel.

The tests were almost like painting and if she didn’t know that it was all supposed to be toxic poison she might have enjoyed the ability to create portal surfaces wherever she wanted them. Why couldn’t they have added a gun that used this, the test chambers would have been so much easier.

And yet somehow the tests were still difficult. After the first one they made their way through the walkways towards, hopefully not very many more.

At least GLaDOS enjoyed the next one. Or at least she enjoyed the rant that Cave Johnson went on about lemons.

“Yeah burn his house down! Burning people, he’s saying what we’re all thinking!”

Chell meanwhile was thinking that this Cave Johnson was a bad influence on her A.I. However then she finished the test and the rant changed towards something more frightfully familiar. The subject of A.I. Chell stopped near the exit as Cave Johnson continued to talk in his recording, all those years ago.

“Now I’ll say this- and I’m gonna say it on tape so everybody hears it a hundred times a day. If I die before you people can pour me into a computer. I want Caroline to run this place. Now she’ll argue. She’ll say she can’t, she’s modest like that. But you make her. Hell, put her in my computer. I don’t care.”

There was another long cough and Chell remained completely still, was this really....

“Alright, test’s over. You can head on back to your desk.”

“Goodbye sir.”

The A.I’s tone was soft and almost..sentimental, if she could ever associate that tone with her. Chell now stared at GLaDOS. Who was not freaking out at what she’d just said. This, this brought up so many questions. But she couldn’t ask any of them and who knew if GLaDOS would tell her anything anyway.

So after a moment she continued towards the exit, as though nothing had changed. Which, it hadn’t really. But at the same time, some things you can’t just un-hear.

GLaDOS however seemed more encouraged. And at least was speaking in her normal voice again, which Chell found somewhat relieving in a weird way. Now if only she wasn’t getting really excited about their certain doom.

“Look that crazy man was right, let’s not take the lemons. We need to march back up there and make him give me back my body..... And he’ll probably kill us because he’s incredibly powerful and I still have no plan!”

Well that was reassuring. GLaDOS and pure honesty were strange enough, maybe the whole Caroline thing on top of being in the potato battery had finally driven her utterly insane.

“Look, I’m not going to lie to you. When I said we were in a lot of trouble I didn’t just mean the explosion. We’re at a serious disadvantage here. I mean it’s a million to one chance and that’s with some generous rounding.”

This was just getting better and better. She’d been hoping that GLaDOS might have some sort of plan, but then again GLaDOS had never thought she could be defeated either so maybe there was still some hope. They were walking into some offices now as GLaDOS continued her new ideas.

“But you know what, let’s get mad! If we’re going to explode, let’s at least explode with some dignity! It’s better then being eaten by a bird! You yelled at that bird monster once, we can yell at this moron too!”

And this time Chell just froze in spot. Because no. No, no no. GLaDOS had been out. She’d checked, she’d checked for the light before....

One rule, she’d had one rule and she’d broken it for that stupid A.I and now she....

The portal gun dropped to the floor.

“Ow. What was that....oh...oh no.” GLaDOS seemed to figure out what was wrong and sounded almost as freaked out as Chell felt. “Look, I didn’t mean to hear you, I went out and then came back on and then went out again. I barely heard anything.”

But she had. She’d heard her talk.

“I don’t know why you’re so upset about this. Look, we can pretend it never happened. I heard nothing, you said nothing, we move on, get rid of that moron and then you get to go away and we never have to see each other ever again.”

Chell stared at the wall. Don’t give them the satisfaction of knowing you can speak. Don’t speak back, don’t talk. Let them underestimate you. She’d leaned towards breaking that rule by laughing at first and then nodding and it was downhill from there. She should have been more careful. She should have just stayed quiet....it was one of her only bits of power she had, trapped in this place. The refusal to speak to them and now...

“Listen..... _Chell,_ please. We need to get out of here, we can think of something to get rid of him. I promise, but we need to go now!” GLaDOS sounded desperate.

However it was the use of her name that snapped Chell out of it. She’d never heard anyone speak it out loud or at least she had no memory of it. Grabbing the portal device off the ground she stared down at the potato. Who seemed to have guessed what exactly it was that had gotten her attention back.

“There look, I knew your name the entire time and never used it, you could talk the entire time and never spoke to me. I’m sure that drives us both crazy. We both were stubborn and look this is the only time I’m _ever_ going to say it so _never_ bring it up again or I’ll deny it. You are the best test subject I’ve had, ever. The only thing you failed at was dying when you were supposed to, so please, please snap out of it because I refuse to let us die down here _because a moron managed to kill us by accident!_ ”

Anger, desperate, desperate anger. Chell could hear the same tone that had been in her own thoughts when she had been fighting against the A.I the first time. As much as she hated to admit it, GLaDOS was right.

She still didn’t want to talk though. Her rule...no just because she couldn’t right now. So she nodded. A compromise.

GLaDOS made a noise that sounded like a sigh.

“Thank goodness. Honestly you’re the most stubborn, frustrating person I’ve ever dealt with. Let’s go and get this done with.”

Chell pulled the Portal gun into a better position and continued further into the offices towards the way out.

-

The way out was through a few more test chambers which did a lot to help Chell get her mind back into what was important. Getting out. Okay, GLaDOS had heard her speak once, but it wasn’t even to her. Her rule was for her own sense of pride really. It wasn’t life ending.

She was never going to speak to or around Wheatley though.

GLaDOS really must have been putting some thought into what they were going to do when they got up because as they made their way into the room with the button they needed to press, she spoke up quickly.

“Wait, no look at that poster. Paradoxes! It’s perfect, no A.I can resist them!”

Chell looked over at the sign, it was one of those safety style posters that scattered the old facility This one on how to deal with rampant A.I. She had to wonder, because it certainly hadn’t helped any of the scientists against GLaDOS when she’d taken over.

“It’s perfect! We go up there get his attention and then I can yell one at him. I just have to...not think about what I’m saying and I should be alright.....probably.”

There was a pause. Chell remained silent, looking over the poster. Okay clearly things were insanely dire if GLaDOS was willing to put her own life on the line rather then just Chell’s.

GLaDOS seemed to take her not moving as some sort of protest.

“Okay, well it’s not the greatest plan to go up against an omnipotent power mad A.I with but it’s better then exploding..... Slightly.”

Chell almost shrugged but just settled from walking over to the red button and hitting it. Another giant vault door opened up, this one from the ceiling, as it did she noticed some tubes coming to connect to the tall gel tubes. Huh, she’d wondered why those were up there.

Thankfully the button also brought down a lift. A not very stable looking metal lift but a way up none the less.

She let out a breath she hadn’t even realized she’d been holding and jumped out of the window down the long drop towards the floor. If there was one thing she enjoyed about this place it was these boots.

What was less fun was the long slow process as the lift made its way up towards Aperture. Well normal Aperture. Who knew what was going on up there. GLaDOS was convinced it was going to explode, which to be fair, the rumblings that shook things every so often seemed to back up. Chell on the other hand wasn’t sure what Wheatley would even be doing. He seemed to go insane with power but what do you do after that? Sure if you’re GLaDOS you’d test but Wheatley had never seemed interested in science when they were running away. Then again he’d wanted to leave at first too. They’d just have to wait till the slow lift finally made its way all the way up.


	10. Chapter Nine: Wheatley Laboratories

What Wheatley apparently had been up to was creating some sort of monstrous blend of turrets and cubes. Because boxes with legs?

“You see, I told you he was a moron.” They were in one of those observational rooms above a test chamber looking down. There was a big screen on the wall now, that Wheatley was appearing on as he tried to order his creations around. It wasn’t going well.

They watched for a moment as Wheatley yelled some more and then stormed off the screen.

“Okay get us down there, solve the test and I’ll hit him with a paradox.”

Chell did so, the test taking probably less time than it took her to get down. Well the sorry excuse of a test, it was putting a box on a button. She put the box on its top, legs waving pathetically in the air. That seemed to do it though and the sphere appeared on the screen again.

“See now I knew you could do it.”

“Hey moron!”

“Oh wait.” Wheatley peered down at them from the screen. “You two again?”

“Okay paradox time.” GLaDOS whispered to Chell before yelling. “THIS SENTENCE IS FALSE...don’t think about it don’t think about it don’t think about-”

“Oh, True! I’ll go with true.”

GLaDOS stopped chanting to herself and even Chell had to resist letting go of the portal gun to just facepalm.

“There is no answer, it’s a paradox! That’s the point!”

“No, I’m pretty sure the answer is true, but I’ll be honest I think I’ve heard that one before. Maybe next time.”

“Ugh, never mind. Look this facility is going to blow up if you don’t give me back my body!”

“Oh I know this one too, false. That one’s false.”

As though on cue, the automated voice could be heard from over the speakers.

“ _Explosion imminent, evacuate the facility immediately.”_

“What, thought I’d fixed that. Just a second.” Wheatley moved off screen for a few seconds. Another warning about a reactor core could be heard before a smashing noise. Maybe he was ‘hacking’ it.

“Okay fixed that up. But you know, really good to see you guys and since you’re here. I’ve been needing some new test subjects.”

Testing, it always came back to testing. Chell glanced down at GLaDOS but the A.I didn’t say anything else. The light was still on so at least she hadn’t fried herself with the paradox. So Chell walked out the open door, they had to go through the metal workings of the facility to get to the next chamber and Wheatley was still talking at them. He brought up some new information at least.

Apparently the body he was in, the one GLaDOS had been in, came with a need to test. Like a physical need. Which explained his sudden interest in it. He sounded...creepy when he talked about it though.

“So you’re gonna test and I’m gonna watch you.”

The automated voice tried to say something about their impending doom again but Wheatley just yelled at it to shut up.

“I think we’re in trouble.” GLaDOS said while Chell looked around.

They were, but it certainly wasn’t from this test. There was a button that released a cube onto a larger button. The words Test was also written on the wall. It might have been cute if it wasn’t being run by someone who was going to let them die in an explosion rather then accept the fact that the place was going to explode at all.

So Chell pressed the button and solved probably the most pathetic excuse of a test ever.

She really wished she hadn’t.

“Ohhhh yes. Well done.”

He went on but Chell tried to block out what he was saying. Covering her ears would be too obvious so she just tried to remember less annoying....and creepy, near sexual noises. Like sirens blaring. She moved to go to the next chamber but apparently Wheatley figured he’d had a new idea.

“You know what, if test making is really ‘so hard’ why don’t I just get you to solve the same test all over again. That’s a much better idea.”

Chell didn’t reply but she could hear GLaDOS mutter under her breath “moron” too quietly for anyone else to hear.

After the test ended, it was still the button after all. Wheatley seemed confused that he’d gotten nothing from it. Chell was relieved and GLaDOS stayed quiet until they reached the normal elevator.

-

“Okay well the paradox plan didn’t work. And, it almost killed me.”

Chell had stopped waking when they’d reached the elevator but at that, she turned the portal gun a bit to look at GLaDOS. She hadn’t put much stock into the paradox itself if only because she still figured someone at Aperture would have tried that against GLaDOS when she’d been killing them all. But apparently it almost did work this time. GLaDOS seemed to misunderstand her look.

“Yes apparently he’s just that dumb even a paradox can’t take him out. The idiot.”

Chell was still a bit unsure. But there wasn’t really a non verbal way to ask your temporary ally if they were alright after almost dying from a word problem so she simply nodded. GLaDOS however seemed to find that interesting.

“You’re still responding...I thought you might stop that after well...after that thing we’re not mentioning...and returning here. But no, that’s good. Just ...ah maybe don’t do it in front of the moron. It’s just that...the more he underestimates you, the more of a chance we have....that’s all.”

It was....a logical response, but there seemed to be something else behind it. Or at least in the tone in her voice. However Chell just nodded again and then walked into the elevator.

“....I’ll tell you more about the testing itch later, we’d better get to the next chamber before he notices we’re not there yet. At least we know that won’t be difficult. That idiot doesn’t know a thing about building testing chambers.”

And as the elevator shot up, Chell had to agree. She’d prefer non deadly test chambers of course but honestly that had been pathetic.


	11. Chapter Ten: Deadly Test Chambers

“And here’s the test chamber I just invented. Nice isn’t it.”

“This is my test!”

Chell looked around as the two A.I argued over whose test it was. Wheatley was trying to prove his point by writing TEST on the wall again. It certainly was a better made test then the last one. There was a button on the ceiling after all. Well at least she could stretch her testing muscles properly while they tried to avoid death.

While attempting to solve the test chamber, Chell accidentally broke the monitor that Wheatley was on. He was condescending about it and Chell made up a new goal. Break every single screen she could find. Either GLaDOS could hear her thoughts or the A.I knew her too well because as they walked towards the elevator, ignoring Wheatley’s noises, she chuckled.

“Please tell me you’ll do that to the rest of those stupid monitors.”

Maybe this was a test to see if she was going to say anything again, or maybe Chell was starting to get as paranoid as everyone in the facility. She just smirked. When GLaDOS laughed, she knew the message had been received. Some things you didn’t need words for.

What did need words were however was GLaDOS telling her she couldn’t help her out with any of the tests.

“I can’t. I know I made them and yes they’ll be deadly but....Just...you know what, I’ll show you what happens when you solve this next one. Trust me. There’s a good reason.”

And Chell did trust her, at least for this. It was weird, working with GLaDOS. The A.I was snarky and made some comments but she wasn’t being overly cruel to her and they were working together. At some level they both had to trust each other. Just when she thought her life couldn’t get any stranger. Maybe GLaDOS wouldn’t betray her when they reached the end of this. Now that would be a miracle.

-

The next chamber was...well there was a fall that Chell didn’t think that even she would survive. Definitely made by GLaDOS. And more of the gravity funnels. Those were actually kind of fun if you overlooked the near death every time you changed a portal sort of way. Either way she ignored Wheatley more as she worked on her two goals. One break the monitor and two solve the test.

Both ended up working. The first one, the breaking of the monitor just made Wheatley talk about how many monitors he had and really she was helping him by destroying them. That was good to hear, she’d be sure to help him more in the future. She almost wished she could say that to GLaDOS. ....clearly this team up was getting to her, she was wanting to talk to not only someone but make a joke to the A.I who had tried to kill her multiple times.

She really needed to get out of here. She was starting to think oddly. It was probably the lack of actual oxygen.

Apparently she was taking too long though because Wheatley started talking again.

“Look can you hurry this up....You know what, I’ll just tell you how to solve it. See that button you just press _itttt aharh!!_.” Whatever happened when he started to give up the answer was apparently very painful as he gave up and told her to do it on her own. It looked like an electrical shock of some sort.

“And that is why I can’t help you with the tests.” GLaDOS muttered. “And here I actually had a plan to show....actually you know what? Wait till you actually solve it. I bet this will still work.”

Okay yeah, might want to avoid that sort of thing, especially if you were in a small potato battery. Chell just went on with solving the test chamber. Which she did manage even without any hints. Honestly press the button? That was the end goal of almost every test chamber.

When she solved the puzzle, Wheatley was his usual creepy self with talking about how great it felt but GLaDOS interrupted.

“Thanks, all we had to do was pull that leaver.”

“What no you didn’t you pressed the butto--- _AARH!!_.”

Chell restrained a laugh as they walked out the door. GLaDOS meanwhile just chuckled from her potato.

“I know we’re in a lot of trouble and probably about to die....but that was worth it.”

It really, really was.

\--

The bad news in the next chamber was that Wheatley had found a bunch of new test chambers that had been kept in storage. Also a comment about getting rid of the skeletons inside. Chell shot a look down at GLaDOS.

“Wonderful.” The AI muttered, ignoring the look, or misinterpreting it. “This is what I get for keeping good records.”

The skeletons comment however was a reminder of who, or what she was making a deal with. GLaDOS might be being nicer now, but that’s because Chell was being useful.

She pretended that didn’t annoy her at all, because it shouldn’t as she knew that already. She at least managed to let out some of that feeling she didn’t have by smashing another monitor. That helped. Or it would help, if she had been annoyed. Which she wasn’t.

Solving the puzzle however didn’t seem to get Wheatley as thrilled as he was at all the others. Disappointing was the word he used.

“Oh no....it’s happening sooner then I expected.” GLaDOS muttered to Chell once they were outside the chambers and near the elevator.

The elevators in the tests were at least still functioning. Even with the frequent tremors that shook the building every so often. GLaDOS however started to talk before they got in.

“Okay look, long story short before he catches on were talking, well I’m talking. That body he’s in, my body I should say. Has a build in euphoric response to testing. Eventually you build up a resistance to it and it can get a little...well unbearable. Unless you have the mental capacity to get past it of course.”

Chell meanwhile was just looking at the A.I again. Because, okay she was starting to think that the people who started this place and built GLaDOS were worse then even GLaDOS could ever be.

“It didn’t mater to me, I was in it for the science, him though....the response is all he seems to care about. Which means if he doesn’t get it....well just keep testing, I’ll try to think of a way out before it gets to that.”

Chell almost didn’t but then nodded as they got into the elevator. They were still a temporary team and yes she was working with someone who had no value for human life but hey at least she was being insulted less.

-

Wheatley however was in a mood in the next chamber. A mood that said maybe GLaDOS should hurry her own plans up.

“Okay well it seems like polite, normal methods don’t work on you so why don’t we try things her way.....fatty. Fatty...fatty adopted no parents.”

Chell kept her face neutral but wanted to role her eyes. She’d ignored GLaDOS’ long rants of actual insults, this was almost more insulti-.

“And?”

GLaDOS spoke up, causing Wheatley to look down at her.

“Ah, and?”

“What exactly is wrong with being adopted?”

After a few failed attempts at reasons, Wheatley backtracked and started to explain that no, no he was fine with adopted people. Had loads of them as friends, really.

GLaDOS however took a moment to whisper to Chell. “By the way you are adopted and that is terrible but work with me here.”

Chell managed to keep a straight face at that too. Honestly it was a bit of a relief after that defence. GLaDOS insulted her, not defended her. That was how things worked.

“And look at her you moron, she’s not fat.”

Chell meanwhile was looking around the test chamber, working out how to start, she figured she’d ignore whatever GLaDOS muttered to her about her weight after that. But to her surprise, the A.I didn’t say anything else to her. Wheatley on the other hand.

“I AM NOT A MORON.”

Wheatley watched them through the rest of the test silently, at least until Chell broke his screen and he threw a small fit about how was he the moron if she kept breaking everything around her.

“You really do have brain damage!”

Ah there it was, a real insult. Now those were easier to ignore.

“At least she has a brain!” GLaDOS must just like yelling back at Wheatley, so Chell continued and solved the test chamber before things could get worse.

They did.

“Argh, if I’m such a moron then why can’t you just solve a simple test properly?”

“I may have pushed the moron thing a little too much.” GLaDOS said as they reached the elevator. “Honestly though my insults were much better then that, besides if you were brain damaged you wouldn’t have lasted this long.”

That was...

“Just because you’re a murderer doesn’t mean you can’t be smart.”

This was just getting confusing.

-

She knew there was something wrong with the next chamber because when she walked in, there was music.

“Oh no....he’s playing classical music.” GLaDOS groaned. Wheatley however was suddenly in a fine mood as he started talking about the books he was reading. He spent most of the test chamber trying to convince them he was intelligent.

Chell just ignored it all and went to solve the test and of course break the monitor. If GLaDOS was going to continue yelling at Wheatley then she was going to continue to break those monitors.

The tests were getting more and more difficult though and more and more deadly. Though apparently not good enough for Wheatley’s test euphoria thing.

It was clear the facility wasn’t holding up well either, or at least that’s probably what the blue error screens on the video walls meant when they came up from the next elevator.

Wheatley however was still more focused on the test euphoria because when they got in there, the floor, no everything started to move.

“Don’t worry, just moving the old test chamber was a bit closer to me. Had a thought, like I do, that if it’s closer to to me, the results will be better.”

“It won’t.” GLaDOS muttered. But quiet enough so only Chell could hear. “He’s moving us closer to him though. We might not get a better chance. Be ready.”

She was, she was ready to get out of here and leave all this madness behind her. But first she had to finish her part. The testing continued.

At least at the end of this one he seemed to accept the problem wasn’t with how she was solving the tests.

-

This however just lead him into trying to fix it. The next test chamber had him having the idea of taping the tests and then watching ten at once.

GLaDOS at least was keeping her insults quieter now. “The idiot. What, does he think we don’t record test chambers? How would we re-watch them later? Honestly what sort of facility does he think I was running here?....Oh and that won’t work either.”

It didn’t matter though because Wheatley couldn’t even stay away long enough to not see the test be completed.

“Argh, why are you making this so hard for me?”

“Because you’re an idiot.” At least GLaDOS’ mutterings were matching her own thoughts for once. As they walked into the elevator room a panel fell from the ceiling. The rumblings had been getting worse and worse as they continued.

“Remember when I told you he was designed to make bad decisions? Because I think he’s decided to not to maintain any of the crucial functions required to keep this facility from exploding.”

-

Everything was getting worse. In the next chamber the rumbling got louder.

“My facility.” GLaDOS seemed in actual pain. Comparing this to the end of her world was apparently the right metaphor. “This place is self destructing you idiot!”

“Was, was self destructing.” Wheatley replied in the proud voice he used all the time. Chell wondered if he was programmed like that for a reason. “Already fixed it.” He then used the same tone to try and explain away the next two tremors and the continuing fall of tiles from the ceiling.

Like clockwork the automated voice then chimed in with the real news/warning that the nuclear core was overheating.

“Just ignore what he’s saying and keep on testing!”

They did. Only because it was the only way to move forward though.

At least it was until they reached the end of the test and it turned out the lift was melted. In its place was one of the gravity funnels moving to the right.

Chell almost sighed but stepped into the gravity flow over the bottomless pit. At the very least, this worked.

“Well, since you’re here might as well give you the tour.”

-

It was a short tour. There were some lights he didn’t know the source off and then they were almost squished by a testing chamber. Luckily Wheatley moved them out of the way of that.

By turning the gravity funnel off.

The real luck was when the bottomless fall let them smash through the roof of what appeared to be an office.

Chell offered a quick thank you in her head to whoever had invented these long fall boots. At this point she didn’t care if it was GLaDOS or even any of the insane scientists who ran this place. They had saved her life so many times at this point she’d have thanked Cave ‘Safety is for Babies’ Johnson.

“Oh good you’re still in one piece.” GLaDOS spoke up as Chell turned towards what seemed like a way out. “We’ll have to find our way back up, we’re behind the scenes again now.” They walked outside to another rickety metal pathway. Well parts of one, it was falling apart as well.

Chell expected more moaning or anger from GLaDOS at the sight, but her response was less general, straight to her and more casual.

“Hey, after seeing what he’s done to my facility, after we take over again. Is it alright if I kill him?”

Chell didn’t know what to think of that. GLaDOS didn’t ask permission she just killed people. And she certainly didn’t ask permission from her test subject. Honestly a small part of Chell figured that she was still going to try and kill her after all this. Damn, at this point if she did, the betrayal was going to feel worse then Wheatley’s, let alone the first time she’d tried kill her.

So they just continued in relative silence. This time GLaDOS did know the way and pointed out where to go to get back to the next available test chamber.

-

“You’re alive!” Wheatley apparently seemed to think they’d died and now he was making up some excuse about why he was still getting a test chamber ready, despite that. Clearly for them and no one else of course. Which, Chell was suddenly more alert towards. As far as she knew, they were the only ones who could test here. That’s why the monster turretboxes had been made after all.

Her thoughts on that however were quickly put aside when Wheatley decided that to fix the problem of having no exit in the tests, he’d just smash two test chambers together. Which he did, while talking.

“You know after you told me to turn that beam off, I went poking around for other test subjects ....but nope still all dead. No luck there. But...I did find something. Reminds me, got a surprise for you. A big one. Seriously, you’re going to love it.”

Right, the only surprises you got from A.I’s at Aperture were death. As they finished the test however Wheatley decided that he’d give them some more hints to his ‘great’ surprise.

“Seriously you two are going to love this surprise. You might say you’re both going to love it...until it kills you. Until you’re dead.”

There was a few more like that before GLaDOS groaned. “Yes we get it.” And Chell decided to just walk though the exit. This time, thank goodness, with a working elevator.

-

As the doors opened GLaDOS spoke up again. “Okay he’s not even trying to be subtle anymore. Or maybe he is, in which case, wow that’s kind of sad.”

Chell couldn’t help it. A sputter of laughter slipped out. She froze for a moment then relaxed her shoulders. Wheatley hadn’t heard it and honestly at this point that’s what mattered. GLaDOS stayed silent for only a brief moment.

“Well....at least your sense of timing’s getting better. Anyway, he’s clearly going to try and kill us.”

Well yes that much was obvious.

It became really obvious when the hallway was broken in half by an ‘accidentally’ dropped pipe. The pipe was carrying conversion gel though so they managed to get back into the chamber.

There was another test inside, a real one it seemed. Though Wheatley felt compelled to inform them with glee that there was only three more chambers till their great surprise. Then laughed evilly. Like really obviously evilly. Chell was starting to wish she could draw a twirly moustache or something on his screen rather then smash it, but she had to settle for smashing it like all the others.

Aside from his annoyance at another broken screen though, after finishing the test, he sounded disinterested.

“So he’s not angry all of a sudden, even though he should be going out of his mind with test withdrawal.” GLaDOS was musing as they walked onward. “What did he find back there?”

-

“Just two more chambers till your big surprise! I bet you’re both dying to know what it is....Sorry can’t ruin the surprise.”

Another mess of a test chamber. Chell looked around as GLaDOS spoke to her.

“We’re running out of time. I think I can break us out in the next chamber, so just play along”

That sounded promising. She’d take any plan at the moment. However as she figured out her first step was to jump on an aerial faith plate...

“SURPRISE! We’re doing it now!”

The plate shot them sideways to another plate which shot them into a gravity funnel.

“Okay, credit where credit is due. For a little idiot built specifically to come up with stupid, unworkable plans, that was a pretty well laid trap.”

Great.

Meanwhile Wheatley decided to explain why he didn’t need them anymore. Apparently what he’d found back there were two robots built for testing.

“Oh no. He’s found the co-operative testing initiative.” GLaDOS only confirmed this. At least sounding a bit guilty as she then answered Chell’s unspoken question. “It’s something I came up with to phase out human testing just before you two escaped...it wasn’t anything personal. Just you know, you did kill me, fair is fair.”

Chell didn’t really get a chance to even think of a response or non verbal response to that as they were suddenly dropped again. Landing on a small platform isolated in a room....surrounded by large plates with spikes and Wheatley on another monitor. GLaDOS groaned.

“Well this is the part where he kills us.”


	12. Chapter Eleven: The Part Where He Kills You

“Hello, this is the part where I kill you!”

No. This was not going to be the part where he killed them. As Wheatley chattered on about how he got the great idea for steal plates with spikes, Chell noticed a surface above them walk way with a wall. A white one. Below her wouldn’t work but then she saw it.

Conversion gel was dripping down onto a surface. A spike had probably punched through a pipe or something. So quickly before the monologue could end she shot two swift portals. Instantly she was hit in the face with a giant splash of conversion gel. It covered the ground under her though and that was enough.

“What, no, no, no. Stand there!”

She shot a portal down and fell through just as the machine was activated and watched all the plates smash the place she had just been standing from above on the small walkway.

“Okay, more credit where credit is due.....that was a pretty amazing escape.” GLaDOS spoke up as they rushed towards the exit.

Wheatley however was still talking, trying to get them to come back. Well her to come back as he was suddenly talking about how wasn’t it great in the old days when they were friends. Great friends.

“And I’d say something like comeback, and you would. What happened to those days?”

You kinda destroyed them Chell thought to herself as they kept making an escape. The place was still a broken mess so that meant more portals and more jumping. And avoiding spike plates, that was apparently going to be a thing now. She made it to the door while Wheatley was saying something he probably hoped sounded ominous about the games beginning.

-

It was more like an echo then a game though as Wheatley smashed things together to stop them from escaping. This was just like when she was escaping with him and GLaDOS had been the one desperately trying to stop them.

Of course at that time the facility wasn’t also collapsing on them.

Oh and the A.I trying to catch them at the moment was a moron. The death trap they had to go through because there was no other option was filled with the broken turrets. Chell glanced at them for a moment and then just ran out the open door and dropping down to the next walkway.

“Oh those were the crap turrets weren’t they.”

Yup.

“And here I thought he couldn’t get anymore pathetic.” GLaDOS remarked dryly.

The next trap had real turrets, but while Wheatley was going on about some card metaphor, Chell used the funnels to sweep the turrets out. Then she jumped in it herself, avoided the spiny blade wall that appeared by simply stepping out of the funnel onto the ground she had been trying to get to in the first place.

“No! That was....I mean, good. Good. Finally a nemesis worthy of my vast intellect. Just like the classics.”

They were both ignoring him at this point as Chell used a funnel to get them across another gap.

“Holmes vs. Moriarty, Aristotle vs ....MASHY SPIKE PLATE.”

As the giant spike plate smashed in front of them, Chell shot the right portal to drop them into one moving the other way.

“What, no stay still!” The spike plate followed after them, trying to smash them but broke something and was smashed itself by the time they reached something Chell could jump down onto.

The gel really was coming in handy, it was a good thing those pipes came up with them. Chell used the blue gel to take out more of the actual turrets. Wheatley had gone off saying he had a new plan or something. She decided to take care of this death trap first though before concentrating on what it could be.

As they got through that though GLaDOS decided to share what else was on her mind..

“I’ve been thinking. Crushing is far too good for him. First he’ll spend a year in the incinerator. Year two, cryogenic refrigeration wing. Then TEN years in the chamber I built where all the robots scream at you. THEN I’ll kill him....maybe. Unless I think of something worse.”

Who knew that death by neurotoxin and rockets actually had been GLaDOS playing nice. Meanwhile Chell discovered that Aperture hadn’t thought itself deadly enough because there was suddenly a pipe that was delivering bombs. Well at least she could put that to good use.

Using the portals she used on to smash open the pipe of conversion gel behind them. The stuff my be annoying, and potentially lethal but it really was coming in handy.

-

They were on more catwalks that lead to a conveyor belt. One that was soon taken control of by Wheatley to try and push her towards another smasher. She calmly stepped on to the next catwalk that was next to it.

“Ahh no don’t do that.....ah. Okay wait, I thought it was time we had a little chat.”

Wheatley apparently was changing tactics once again because now...he was trying to convince her to jump into the masher because.....he had an evil lair ahead that was really going to kill her. He was apparently ignoring her use the portal gun and the orange gel but that was fine by her.

“You have got to be kidding me.” GLaDOS muttered as he just kept talking.

Chell used the portal to smash his monitor with a bomb.

“Okay, I’ll take that as a no then. Fine. May the best man win. Sphere. Man.... May the best man sphere win. Just swapped that in, much more clever.....probably read it in a book.” He finally vanished from the screen.

Chell reset the portal to get them out of there.

“You really are full of surprises.” GLaDOS said as they leaped onto the now slippery conveyor belt. “We might just get this done.”

-

Her good mood vanished though as they ended up in what could only be described as a disaster area.

“Oh.my.god....what has he done to this place?”

It was hard to argue with that tone, there were chunks missing out of all the walls, floors were cracked and broken and led into another bottomless fall. The place was falling apart around them.

There were still working parts though and Chell used those to get them closer to this so called lair.

-

While they were in one of the beams though, GLaDOS spoke up again. “Look, I’m not stupid, I know you don’t want to put me back in charge. You think I’m going to betray you. And honestly on most days you’d probably be right.”

Chell remained silent, wondering where this was going. Yes she had thought that, she had been starting to hope she wouldn’t betray her for a while. But then again everything was insane and she’d been coated in enough toxins at this point that she probably wasn’t thinking straight all the time.

“Just...look. The scientists were always putting cores on me, to regulate my behaviour. I’ve heard voices my entire life. But...now I hear the voice of a conscience, and it’s terrifying, because for the first time it’s my voice.”

That made Chell stare. But GLaDOS wasn’t done.

“No really I’m being serious, I think there’s something really wrong with me.”

GLaDOS actually sounded terrified. Which if she thought about it. And she could only half think about it as she was still in the process of actually getting them somewhere. Made a bit of sense. If you never thought anything you did was wrong and then were suddenly confronted by yourself telling you it was? That had to be weird.

She’d have to think on that later, hopefully after the new found conscience made GLaDOS let her go. If that was how it was going to end.

They’d have to get rid of Wheatley and not die in an explosion to find out first though.

GLaDOS did seem to have an actual plan thankfully. There was a pile of what she described as corrupted cores in a giant pile that she said once plugged in, she’d be able to move.

“You find a way to stun him and I’ll send you a core. Enough of these we might be able to get him corrupt enough for another core transfer.”

It sounded good. Chell nodded and they walked through a sea of many glass pipes filled with gels. At the end of the walkway was a familiar machine.

“Plug me in and I’ll take you up.”

Thankfully the machine accepted a potato battery in place of a core, for some reason and she plugged her in. They both had no other choice after all. GLaDOS seemed to realize this. So as the platform started up she continued to talk.

“Look, even if you think we’re still enemies, we’re enemies with a common interest: Revenge. You like revenge right? Everybody likes revenge. Well let’s go get some.”

Revenge. It seemed like everyone here was always getting revenge over something. But she wasn’t immune to that so she just waited and clutched her portal gun a little closer. This was almost over.


	13. Chapter Twelve: Insert Dramatic Fight Music Here

“Well, well, well. Welcome to my **LAIR**.”

GLaDOS went back down after Chell jumped off the platform. Wheatley was making his voice boom for that last LAIR bit while she tried to examine the room while he was talking. Apparently the building was going to explode in six minutes and he planned to kill her in three, take a break and then fix the problem in two.

Well at least that explained why parts of the walls were on fire. However she was realizing something and he suddenly got her attention.

“So, I took the liberty of watching the tapes of you killing _her_ , and I’m not going to make the same mistakes as her. Four part plan is this. One: No Portal surfaces. Two: Start the Neurotoxin immediately. Three: Bomb-proof shields for me. Which leads me to Four: Bombs for throwing at you. You know, this plan is so good I’m going to give you a sporting chance and turn off the neurotoxin. Only joking. Goodbye.”

Well this was.....not an idiotic plan. The neurotoxin was pumping into the room, nothing she shot her portals at would stick and the place was due to blow up soon. She needed to think. Which was why it wasn’t helping that he kept talking. This was GLaDOS all over again. Only worse because somehow he talked MORE.

He’d seemed to take another thing from the tapes of her and GLaDOS as he was back to insults and he was getting better at them. Still some fat jokes and comments on how pathetic she was compared to him and how everything was pointless so really don’t try, but there were a few stingers here and there that she actually had to ignore rather then effortlessly ignore.

“I should congratulate you by the way. I didn’t think you’d actually make such a worthy opponent. Weren’t you supposed to be brain damaged or something. Brain damaged like a fox.”

That was it, she wasn’t dying to someone this stupid. She’d managed to avoid all bombs so far. After her many test chambers she was good at avoiding things. She did get an idea though just as he started telling her how she wasn’t the first person he’d woken up and how they’d all died trying to get the portal gun. As she was trying to figure out where to stand though he started to get...weird.

Still talking about how she didn’t catch him when he dropped from his rail the first time. That was a normal complaint but...

“Oh or that time you woke her up just as we were about to escape. And we could have talked our way out of it. Except you forgot to tell me that you'd murdered her! And that _she needed you to live_ , so the only available vent for her rage would be good old crushable Wheatley.”

She almost froze at that point because clearly the neurotoxin was getting to her. Needed her to live? GLaDOS was trying to kill her she didn’t.... no wait this was just more stupidity... She swore in her head as she missed her chance and jumped back away from the bomb as he ranted on about her resenting his success. She had one more chance at this, she couldn’t hold out much longer against the toxin in the air.

“Am I being too vague? I despise you. I loathe you. You arrogant, smugly quiet, awful jumpsuited monster of a woman. You and your little potato friend. This place would have been a _triumph_ if it wasn't for you!"

And at that moment of pure hatred, Chell jumped out of the way as a bomb hit the glass pipe behind her and sprayed conversion gel everywhere.

-

Wheatley yelled and then quickly tried to pass it off as a trap. However Chell was in her zone now and had spotted all the areas that the gel had gotten. He was still throwing bombs. Well then, now that he was trying to cover the bottom of his chassis, she had a little surprise for the top.

Standing close and diving away just as a bomb fell into her hidden portal she grinned.

“AHHHH!!!”

The entire chassis went limp and she suddenly heard GLaDOS again.

“I’m delivering the first core up near the catwalk. Grab it and attach it to him!”

The core being dangled down was talking non stop about space for some reason. Now that would be annoying to listen to. Jumping down before things came apart more she found some of the blue gel to use to jump up and attach the core.

This seemed to wake Wheatley up. The good news was that the neurotoxin turned off. The bad news was it turned off because the vent system was compromised and the place was going to explode in four minutes.

Still at least she could breathe better.

Wheatley meanwhile was freaking out.

“What, what’s going on. Why are the bombs stuck on...wait you stuck something....that’s a core on me. You stuck a core on me! Who told you to do that, was it _her_?”

She ignored him and with the bombs stuck on, used the portals to knock him out with another.

“Good, here comes another core.”

She had to jump up a few times to get this one. A talkative one that kept calling her pretty lady and calling himself the adventure sphere. The annoying sphere more like it. He was just asking her if she wanted to go on a lady break while he took care of the work when she fit him on the body.

-

Wheatley woke up again after that and the programmed voice announced that they had two more minutes, possibly, the clock was broken. Wheatley was more annoyed about the presence of a second core.

“I told you not to listen, but you never do that do you!”

He had his shields in a hard position to reach so she had to listen to more ranting as she worked out the best angle.

He was still ranting about not getting caught, how everything was her fault and how he was duped into her plan. Where she was going to murder him at the end of course.

“You're in this together, aren't you? You've been playing me the whole time! Both of you! First you make me think you're _brain damaged_! Then you convince me you're sworn enemies with your _best friend_ over here! Then when I reluctantly accept the responsibility of taking control of this place, you decide to _run off together_! Just when I needed you the most!"

It was clear he no longer had any grasp on reality. She managed to shoot another bomb in time and GLaDOS dropped down another core.

“This one should do it.”

It was another talkative one in a hard place to reach. Though at least this one was just rambling about facts that were all wrong. It took her a bit to get to the core but she managed and soon jumped up on the blue gel to deliver the hopefully last core.

_“Warning, core corruption at 100 percent.”_

It was.

GLaDOS came out of the floor then and the core transfer procedure started all over again. Which lead to another familiar situation. The stalemate. Though Wheatley almost ruined it for himself by being sarcastic which the generated voice took to mean a yes. That would have been nice. Sadly he got his no in just in time and the stalemate button appeared.

It also activated sprinklers to put out the fire, which left only a small area under the main chassis with conversion gel. Apparently Wheatley hadn’t known that was a thing.

This time around it was GLaDOS yelling for her to push the button and Wheatley yelling at her not to press it. There was a surface above it on the ceiling that she could use but she had to put a portal right under Wheatley to jump down to get to it. They were so close but the time was running out. She ignored his yelling above her, leaped down towards the button and -

 

“ **PART FIVE. BOOBY TRAP THE STALEMATE BUTTON!”**

 

Chell went flying backwards, her boots broken in the explosion and she smashed into the ground on her side. She wasn’t out yet though and through the haze in her head, the pain in her legs and arms, she pushed herself up from the floor.

“What, are you still alive!? You are joking, you have got to be kidding me! Well I’m still in control and I HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO FIX THIS PLACE.”

He was ranting about playing cat and mouse but Chell couldn’t hear him, the portal gun was still next to her and so she picked that up.

Then the ceiling, roof was ripped off and she could see the sky. In fact....she could see the moon.

-

Chell doesn’t think, she just acts, shooting a portal to the one possible surface in view. It shouldn’t work, the moon is thousands and thousands of miles away from them but she’s going to die, they’re going to die. She has to do something. She has to do _anything_.

And suddenly a moment after, there’s a ping and then everything in the room is being sucked down towards the portal she’d placed under his stolen chassis. Everything. Herself included. She has no chance to grab at anything that might keep her in this world as she’s dragged across the floor towards the portal she created.

Everything happens so fast. She’s hanging onto Wheatley’s core, the chassis is just barely holding him in place and he hasn’t been dragged very far through yet. Not like her. She looks around and sees the whole Earth and the surface of the moon. This doesn’t seem possible. She’s in space. As if on cue the space core almost knocks her off as he goes flying through the portal. Her hand is knocked away, but she manages to move it down to grab onto a handle again just in time.

The wind is blowing through as well so she can still breathe but this can’t be healthy and who knows how long she’s going to be able to hold on. Is this how she’s going to die? Lost in space? Even after everything in Aperture, this seems too insane to be real. But it is, and her vision is starting to fade and she’s finding it harder to think.

She wants to scream NO as Wheatley yells at her to just let go, but she won’t give him the satisfaction. Not now, not after keeping her voice silent to him for so long. If she’s going to die, she’ll die in quiet defiance and she’s not letting go.

“Let go! Let go, I’m still connected. I can pull myself in. I can still fix this!”

He’s still yelling, as though she cares about the facility more then her own life. No, if she’s not surviving this, neither is he. She’ll hold him out here to die with her if she has to.

However it turns out she doesn’t have to as a familiar voice cuts in

“I’ve _already_ fixed this and _you_ are not coming back.”

She sees the metal claw coming out and for a moment she thinks this is it, this is the second betrayal. The one she’s been waiting for, dreading. But while the claw smashes away the one thing that connects her to the earth and sends Wheatley’s core flying off through space, it also just as quickly grabs her arm and pulls her down. Wheatley’s frantic cries for her to now grab him trailing off into nothing.

It hurts, she’s going against the gusting wind tunnel here but the machine is stronger and a moment later she’s dropped on the now portal free floor. Her exhausted body has finally reached its limits though and the last thing she sees before falling unconscious is the main eye of GLaDOS’ core being pulled past her by the mechanical arm.


	14. Chapter Thirteen: Back on Earth Pt.1

Chell wakes up. Sort of. She feels dizzy and off and numb, and...and she’s sitting on the floor. 

“Oh thank god you’re alright.”

And there’s what sounds like a worried GLaDOS back in her chassis. Being worried, about her. Clearly this is a dream. She was left in space and this is her dying dream. But she looks around the room. It’s back in some semblance of order now and she realizes that no, this isn't a dream. They did it. GLaDOS saved her and they did it.

She’s not sure which one she’s more surprised by. Instead she sits numbly, half in a daze with GLaDOS’ now clean and orderly chamber in front of her. How long was she out for, it doesn't feel like it's been that long. But then again GLaDOS managed to solve the explosion problem in a few seconds so it might have been only minutes to get the place in order.

She’s thinking too much so she doesn’t have to pay attention to how her mind is wobbling or the pain. Why is there so much pain? Her leg hurts and she feels like she might still be bleeding but everything hurts too much to tell.

GLaDOS isn’t helping. She’s talking still, something about Caroline. Chell tries to pay attention but it’s hard to keep focused.

“You know, being Caroline taught me a valuable lesson. I thought you were my greatest enemy, when all along you were my best friend.”

It was official she really was still in space. Chell tries to hide back a laugh but just hides a wince instead.

"The surge of emotion that shot through me when I saved your life taught me an even more valuable lesson: where Caroline lives in my brain.”

There was a pause.

“Goodbye, Caroline."

The tiles drop down and everything becomes darker. That last sentence was in the normal voice she’d always associate GLaDOS with. Darker and smugger. Disturbingly, she thinks she prefers this one. Though that might be the pain induced delirium talking.

Despite deleting what she claimed was basically her conscience, GLaDOS doesn’t make a move to kill her. She just remains where she is. Meanwhile Chell realizes for the first time she’s sitting slumped against a glass elevator door. But for once she can’t even think of how to move to try and run let alone get into the elevator behind her in case this is a trick.

GLaDOS was still talking.

"You know, deleting Caroline just now taught me a valuable lesson. The best solution to a problem is usually the easiest one. And I'll be honest."

The A.I paused for a moment as though thinking over what she was going to say.

"Killing you? Is hard.”

It had been. However Chell had just been in space. For a while. Also bombs blew up in her face, and she’d inhaled large amounts of neurotoxin while running around. And that wasn’t even counting the gels and lower Aperture. She winces and then there’s a stabbing pain in her side, this time she can’t hide the wince and slight cry of pain.

-

GLaDOS seemed to realize something was wrong now, she was moving closer to look at her. The dim lights had probably hidden the injuries she still had, or maybe just the act of waking up made the A.I think she was fine.

Chell coughed, that hurt too. No. She wasn’t getting up right now. She just looked directly into GLaDOS’ yellow eye, which was a blurry haze and a lot closer then it had been, it looked concerned.

Chell merely grinned, because after all this, everything she’d done to try and escape, she couldn’t do it. Even when the A.I was telling her to leave. It was tragically funny in a way she’d probably hate if her body wasn’t trying to give out on her.

No. Killing her, might have been hard in the past but...now.

“Not. Any. More.”

The last of her energy spent, Chell once again passed out. Certain it would be the last.


	15. Chapter Fourteen: Back on Earth Pt. 2

GLaDOS had everything planned out. She knew what she was going to say. She’d had the test robots, Orange and Blue, move the humans body over to the elevator as she fixed the chamber around them. She was going to say her speech, delete Caroline and then get rid of her...her only friend....annoyance for good.

Chell...the test subject had even woken up sooner then expected, before GLaDOS had time to examine her for injuries. Apparently nothing would kill her. So she had said her piece, looking at her friend...test subject... but looking away as well when she called her that. She didn’t want to see the reaction. She knew it would be either disbelief, anger or worse...pity.

And then she deleted Caroline. Which was probably the best for the remains of the woman, but she liked to think of it as getting rid of her sentimentality and conscience.

However things started to go wrong after that. Not the fact that Ch- the test subject hadn’t been scared by her. If she had, that would have been wrong, but that she didn’t....hadn’t gotten up yet. She was just sitting there, watching her.

So GLaDOS decided to end the suspense and started to tell her how doing the easy thing is the best and, this part she knows the woman...test subject will like.

“Killing you? Is hard.”

But Chell still doesn’t get up and then suddenly there’s a noise from her. She sounds like she’s in pain and GLaDOS moves closer, cursing the fact that she trusted her frien-test subject with the new robots rather then dealing with her, herself. As she gets closer she sees that Chell is....hurt.

The woman looks up and...grins at her.

“Not. Any. More.” And then Chell slumps to her side and GLaDOS has moment of pure terror that makes her think that she didn’t delete Caroline after all.

But she did and this is all her and she needs to do something. She scans the woman's body, and realizes that Chell isn’t dead. Just unconscious. She should have done that the moment she hit the ground from the portal but she’d needed to fix the place and the injuries were hard to see and....and she’s making excuses for herself.

“No, no, no. Not any more? You...you idiot!” She had given her the perfect out and now the woman had to be injured and completely at her mercy? Did she expect her to kill her now. Did she not care? Did she want to....

“How can we go through all of that and suddenly you want to die!”

GLaDOS realizes she’s furious. That’s good, she can work with anger.

“Well fine. I won’t let you.” She turned to find the two new robots. “Blue, Orange. I’m opening the non test chamber facilities. Find one with a medical area. I know they had multiple ones.” She should know, she’d sent many of the employees there when they were testing her. She turned back to look at her unconscious test subject.

“No, you are not allowed to die. I won’t let you, I won’t let you!” She was repeating herself as she fumed to the unconscious form of Chell now but she didn’t care. She was still angry.

Luckily the new robots were easily ordered around and her cameras were coming online as she worked. She could work and fume at the same time, unlike the former moron running this place.

“Good. Alright. We’ll move her there. Then I’m going to make sure she’s fine and then she’s getting kicked out of here like she was supposed to be. Bring a bed over here and I’ll move her on it and then, and then I’ll figure something out.”

It took her a moment to realize that she was trying to reassure herself of this. Caroline wasn’t the cause of all those feelings it seemed. She was just a way to identify them as something inside her. She didn’t like it, but there was little she could do to change that. Right now she had too much to do. On top of Chell deciding to fall over and give up, she still had an entire facility to fix and tests...that’s right the body she was in needed tests.

She needed a way out of that. She needed a lot of things right now. And some of them she wasn’t going to be able to do from her current post. Thoughts racing in nearly fifteen different directions, she set to work. Finally, after being stuck with only 1.6 volts for so long she had access to all the power she needed to think and plot about anything and everything she wanted. It was like having the endless droning of the cores removed from her but a thousand times more freeing. There were so many options now and she could work on half of them at once rather then risk getting burned out after one sudden powerful emotion.

This was her home, this was her kingdom and she was its ruler. She wasn’t just going to fix this, she was going to make it better.

With those thoughts in mind she got to work and started to draw up a list of tasks of things she couldn’t do for the only helpers she had at the moment.


	16. Chapter Fifteen: Not Dead Yet

Chell woke up again. This time more alert. Her head was pounding but her vision was settled. The pain in her legs and arms were duller as well.

“Oh good you’re awake.” The voice came from above and Chell snapped into reality more. Looking around quickly. The last thing she remembered was being in the main chamber with a newly re-powered GLaDOS....and not expecting to ever wake up again.

Now she was...in an office of some sort. Only she was in a cot bed with an actual pillow and blankets, and as she looked down she saw there were bandages on her arms, and from the weight of her body, most likely her legs too.

“I thought you’d just panic more if I kept you in my chamber. Though maybe not, after all you were practically inviting me to kill you with that little stunt you pulled.”

GLaDOS’ voice still held the annoyed tone that had appeared after she’d deleted whatever part of her had once been Caroline, but that....made no sense. She had told Chell that killing her was hard but Chell had....lost. She’d collapsed in front of the A.I, she should be dead by now. Not in a bed.....and who had put the bandages on her? She lifted a blanket to see that she had been right and that the bottom of her legs were bandaged as well.

“You know I can’t answer any of your questions if you don’t ask them.” GLaDOS could see her then. Chell glanced over and finally saw the camera in the corner of the room. “And we both know you can talk now, so why don’t we end that little charade?”

Chell glared at the camera instead.

“Or you could glare. Fine. At least have a drink of water. There should be one next to your bed. There’s painkillers beside it as well. Terribly out of date ones I’m guessing, but there you go.”

Chell glanced over and saw there were some there. She paused before the ache in her head told her to ignore her pride this one time. She took the pills and drank the water down. God, how long had it been since she’d had a drink of water?

“Well at least that’s something. Orange, Blue go help the te- go help Chell into the next room. I’d like to see her face to face.”

Was the use of her name a peace offering? Chell wasn’t sure but looked towards the now opening door to see the two robots that she’d thought she’d seen when she was back from the moon.....right she’d been in space. She rubbed a hand on her forehead. She felt strange, she had vague memories or dreams that didn’t add up. Maybe she had woken up before this but after the last time. She sighed and just decided to wait for her headache to die down, maybe that would help.

“Oh and don’t try and murder these robots would you? I mean, I can just reconstruct them again if you do but I do have better things to be doing with my time.”

Chell ignored the voice, that was a nice familiar action and got up. Or at least she tried to get up and then almost fell down, managing to grab the bed before she reached the floor.

“And that was why I said you’d need help. Honestly, you can solve any test chamber but simple instructions are out of your grasp.”

Chell pulled herself up and sat on the edge of the bed as the two robots moved closer to her. Unlike GLaDOS they spoke to each other with some sort of wordless noises. They were clearly more afraid of her then she was of them as well. They offered her a hand each and sighing again Chell took the offered hands and was pulled up from her bed.

A little too quickly but the robots made noises that sounded apologetic? It was hard to tell, and they walked slower after that.

She hated needing them for support but her legs were weak and while not in extreme pain, it was hard to move. The two robots did help though. She looked them over as they walked. They looked like they were thrown together out of old parts of other Aperture machines. A turret body on one and a core for another. There was an orange light from one and a blue light on the other. Creative names there GLaDOS.

The place was...well it was better looking then it had been before. Nothing was on fire at least.

-

“Before you get here, I should warn you.” GLaDOS’ voice filled the hallways as they walked. “You’ve been out for a bit. Nowhere near our last little mutual near death experiences, but well. I did have to put you in stasis again. Just for a short amount of time. Not even a year.”

Chell wasn’t even sure to think anymore. She just kept walking. She didn’t think she was going towards her death. After all she’d been patched up and not only that, whenever it was that she had fallen unconscious she’d left her fate in the A.I’s hands. And yet here she was, still alive.

It was only when they walked into what she thought was going to be the main chamber that she started to wonder exactly how long she’d been out. GLaDOS worked incredibly fast yes, but....

The room was filled with computer screens and other things and there was an odd looking chair that hung front the ceiling. In it there was...a woman?

No. She could see the person in the chair and the skin was too...something, it was wrong. Synthetic maybe. The person was dressed in a lab coat with something white and black under it and when she looked at its...her face she realized something.

Cold yellow eyes stared out at her from a face framed by short white hair. There was a smirk and the voice just made it obvious.

“Five months, twelve days, three hours, twenty minutes and ten seconds. That’s how long you’ve been unconscious or in stasis. I realized the latter was the best way to fix up the injuries, though I wouldn’t take the bandages off just yet.”

Chell just stared at her.

“Oh right, this is the first time you’re seeing my new body. Do you like it? I had to scavenge together some android parts, and create other things you wouldn’t understand but it worked. You know in a way I almost owe that moron, he made me realize how being trapped in a body that constantly forces you to _need_ to test might be a bad idea.”

She reached back behind her neck and unplugged something that seemed like a long cable. The chair wasn’t very high in the air but more then most people would have been comfortable stepping down from. GLaDOS however just landed neatly on her feet.

“Now I can just test because I love it.” The A.I walked forward towards Chell. “Don’t worry, we won’t explode. I’m more responsible then that idiot. I’d explain how I did it but we both know you wouldn’t understand.”

She stood in front of Chell now. Arms behind her back, watching her closely.

“I suppose you have questions. Well, I know you do. I also know we were going to go back to the whole, oh I can’t talk thing, but you aren’t my test subject anymore so I don’t see what you gain from keeping silent. I _was_ letting you go, back then you know. Before you suddenly decided that you wanted to _die._ ”

Chell frowned, GLaDOS voice had turned hard and sour on that last word.

“What? Annoyed? So was I. Honestly I don’t see how else I could have taken it. I told you killing you was hard and what do you do? You tell me that it isn’t anymore and pass out in front of me!”

GLaDOS was glaring at her, she’d gotten her synthetic face to show expressions, which was...strange. She would have thought GLaDOS wouldn’t want to show more emotions. Though, her chassis and one eye had managed to convey emotions with her voice in the past so maybe it had just seemed natural to include the ability when creating the body.

But one eyed glares aside, this, this was so much more. It wasn’t one narrowed eye it was a furious expression that utterly matched the anger and frustration in her voice. She could also move closer now which was a bit worrying, and move her arms. Gesturing was apparently a habit easily remembered or relearned. She was doing so at the moment and Chell stopped studying her and started to pay attention to what the A.I was saying.

“Do you know _how_ many ways I could have killed you, laying on the floor like that? _Do you_?”

Chell didn’t understand why GLaDOS seemed so angry about this and finally decided to speak up.

“But you...didn’t. Why?”

Her voice seemed to have an affect on the A.I who blinked and seemed to have to stop herself from taking a step back. Maybe the new body was a good thing because Chell could see her ball her hands into fists and knew that question wasn’t one she wanted to answer. But she did, because GLaDOS always had to have an answer for everything. Even if she tried to dodge the actual question with it.

“Of course I didn’t! I noticed you were still bleeding and you were hurt and....and I told you I’d let you go. If I let you go like that then you were going to die and...then...then that just meant the moron managed to kill you! That he won something. Do you honestly think I’d let that him have that, do that? After everything we went through, after everything of mine he almost destroyed, did destroy!?”

GLaDOS was furious now, fists clenched at her side as though she couldn’t believe the question was up for debate.

“He **lost** , he lost _everything._ The Facility, his power, his freedom, _you_. I wasn’t going to let him have anything. Even if he wasn’t here to see it. And if I couldn’t kill you, that moron certainly wasn’t allowed to. You ar-....”

She stopped short and let it trail off into nothing. There was a few moments of silence as Chell watched her closely and GLaDOS closed her eyes. It seemed to calm her down and after a minute she was able to talk normally again. Her hands no longer clenched against her side and her tone calmer, if just as stiff.

“Look, does it really matter why I didn’t kill you? You’re alive, you won. I’m still letting you go. I can’t deal with having you around ruining my tests and trying to kill me anymore.”

“You tried to kill me first.”

GLaDOS looked down at her. Of course she had made sure she was slightly taller then Chell. “It was a _test_. You were a _test subject_ , you were supposed to die, that’s what they _do._ You just lasted longer then any of them and....and then you refused to die!”

Chell folded her arms together and just looked at her.

“Look, it was my first test after taking full control of the facility. I couldn’t just have test subjects leave!” She frowned slightly and then looked to the side. Arms folded together now in front of her as though mirroring Chell unconsciously.

“Anyway you’d have been better off dead then outside anyway. I wasn’t joking about the strange...things outside. Though...I admit I was mostly using them as a way to convince you to give up and just die.” She titled her head slightly. “Though looking back I should have just pretended to let you go and then knocked you out and put you in stasis....that might have worked a lot better.”

Chell however was distracted by the first part even if GLaDOS was still pondering on ways she could have tricked her.

“But then again, how was I supposed to know you’d survive the fire pit.”

“What was outside?” She interrupted GLaDOS’ musings and the A.I looked over at her.

“I told you. I have no idea. Besides, it’s who knows how many years after that. For all we know they’re gone, or humanity is dead or I don’t know. There was a deer up there, so I suppose some things are still alive.” She seemed unconcerned about this.

Chell however didn’t like the way this was going. “You said you saw some humans too.”

“I was lying.” GLaDOS replied blandly. “In case you hadn’t noticed, I do that sometimes.”

Chell was still being supported by the two robots but all this information, everything, she needed to sit down.

GLaDOS seemed to notice this.

“Blue, get the te....get her a chair. And Orange, if you let go of her that will be 50 science collaboration points away from you.”

Chell looked over at GLaDOS as the robot held her tighter.

“Science Collaboration Points.” The A.I replied at the gaze. “It’s apparently a great motivation for them. They’ve been testing the entire time you’ve been out. It’s amazing how much easier testing is when you can blow up and reassemble the test subjects.”

Chell thought she might had nodded blankly but ended up sitting down when a chair soon appeared behind her. GLaDOS stood in front of her, trying to appear positive it seemed.

“There. Look at us, you’re talking....somewhat. I’m not putting you back in tests and neither of us are trying to kill each other. I’d say that’s a good start.”

Chell had made up her mind on one thing at least, conversations with GLaDOS were even more confusing with the android body. But she did have some questions.

“Why was I in stasis so long?”

“Because you were badly injured and I didn’t want you to die before I could kick you out. I thought I just said that.” GLaDOS rolled her eyes. “Besides, you probably don’t remember, but I did say I’d check you out for toxins when we got back from the ruins. So I did that as well while you were out. Good news, your time in lower Aperture left you with almost no tumours.”

“Almost?” Chell’s voice lost its careful even tone and went up a notch. At the smirk on the A.I’s face she knew that’s what she’d been going for.

“There were a few forming but I had those removed. The reassembly machine kept saying we should turn you into a robot or A.I but that’s because they’re the only things he knows how to fix and I might have blown him up a few time for being unhelpful. Besides I’ve been told the procedure is remarkably painful. I really wouldn't recommend it.” Her tone was light and flippant but there was something dark behind that for a moment. However it was gone when she spoke up again. “Besides, I’d end up stuck here with you forever, so no. Fixing your human body before it broke down even more was the best plan.”

“....Thank you.”

And Chell felt she won a point in whatever conversation thing they were doing because GLaDOS opened her mouth to say something and then stopped.

“You’re...welcome.” Was the almost cautious reply.

-

The two of them watched each other for a while in silence. Chell getting used to the A.I’s new appearance, and GLaDOS just looking at her, with a strange expression.

“Well I suppose you should go try and find the remnants of humanity then.” GLaDOS said reluctantly breaking the silence. “You should be able to walk by yourself again by the end of the day and the wounds are only mild now. Mind you, I have no idea what’s out there but really that’s your problem now.”

Chell nodded. This was it, it’s what she’d been waiting her entire...well all she could remember.

“I suppose if you don’t find anyone. Well....” GLaDOS trailed off before stiffly looking away. “Well then I suppose you’ll die but again, not my problem anymore.”

The Blue robot next to her chattered something and GLaDOS whirled around quickly to glare at it as it chattered on.

“What? That’s ridiculous. No. And that didn’t happen, I told you to forget that.”

Chell blinked. But the Orange one started making similar noises. Noises apparently GLaDOS understood. She was being ignored as the two robots moved in front of her and started ‘talking’ with GLaDOS.

“Not you too. I’m telling you that she can’t stay here. Why? Because she wants to leave, I want her to leave and she’s leaving. You are _replacing_ her.”

The blue one looked over at the orange one and they high-fived each other and then pointed back and forth making the same sorts of noises.

“I can’t believe this.” GLaDOS had a hand on her face. “No matter what I test they always rebel. Why does this always happen?”

Chell took a risk “....GLaDOS. What are they saying?”

And the A.I once again froze, eyes wide as she looked past the two test robots that were now high-fiving each other with two hands. Chell suddenly wondered how long it had been since the A.I had last heard someone say her name.

“They feel.....” GLaDOS managed to say, she seemed, well flustered almost. “That it doesn’t seem right to send you back outside if we don’t know what’s out there. For whatever reason they seem to like you. Poor taste perhaps.”

“Oh. Well, tell them I want to go.”

The two robots stopped high-fiving and looked back at her. They began waving their arms at her and one of them seemed to be trying to point to GLaDOS without actually making it look like it was. Chell however generally had one eye on GLaDOS at most times, it was the safest course with the A.I. This time she was surprised to see that the A.I seemed to go still and keep a stiff expression on her face.

Shouldn’t she be happy at this? She was just saying that she wanted to kick Chell out.

‘I lied, I do that sometimes.’ suddenly came back into her mind.

Chell frowned slightly. The robots actions made it pretty clear at least that GLaDOS wasn’t lying about what they were saying. And if they were there, GLaDOS didn’t need her. And she’d been pretty clear about wanting her gone.

“I want to see outside.” Chell looked over at the robots. “Besides, I’m not a test subject anymore. I’m not a scientist. Last I heard, I’m not even a full time employee.”

This time GLaDOS glared at her. Though it wasn’t as severe as the others she’d gotten before. “I think I liked it better when you weren’t talking. Though at least I know you were listening at some points.”

Chell shook her head and slowly got up. Then sat back down again. Nope, still too tired. What were her odds of getting anywhere? She was still hurt and even if she could walk by the end of the day she had no idea where anything was.

She glanced over at GLaDOS, this didn’t seem like a way to trick her into testing. Or even leaving to die in the wilderness if the reaction she was trying to hide was anything to go by. Did the A.I even know what she wanted? Did Chell for that matter?

The robots looked at each other and started chittering again. GLaDOS groaned. “She can’t understand you, stop asking her questions....no I’m not going to translate.”

They looked at her and then folded their arms after saying something else.

“I can blow you up you know.”

Still nothing.

“It’s incredibly painful as I’m sure you recall.”

Nope.

Chell was watching now with something close to wonder.

“Fine. Chell they want to say, if there’s no people outside you can come back and help them...no I told you, she’s leaving. I told her I was letting her go and ...... **quiet both of you!** ”

GLaDOS’ voice finally rose into the furious one of that of the Queen of Aperture Science. It then dropped down to the equally as serious terse one. “Leave this room now or I will make sure you get taken apart and put into calculators. Do I make myself clear?”

The two of them looked at each other, and then for some reason gave Chell a thumbs up before running off.

-

GLaDOS meanwhile was clinging to her left elbow with her other hand. Distressed and angry, not a good combination. Chell suddenly wished she could move faster because leaving the room might be a good idea if the A.I was acting like this. This was when neurotoxin tended to enter the picture. But instead GLaDOS just looked over at her.

Her voice was bland, dry and unfeeling. She could switch her emotions quickly, Chell gave her that.

“There. Now they’re gone and we can talk like adults. You want to leave and I.don’t.need.you.” The words were almost forced out at the end. “You can go whenever you like, you’re a test ruining monster and I don’t want you to come back ever again. Is that clear?”

Chell watched her. Something stuck her as familiar. It was remembered in a haze of adrenaline and neurotoxin but it was there. She was at a crossroads right now. She'd never thought much past escape Aperture, to what she was going to do if she did get out. She'd just wanted out. She hadn't focused on much besides the tests because she'd needed to keep her mind clear in order to survive. She'd been alone or escaping most of the time. Well, sometime after Wheatley betrayed her and she’d been forced to team up with GLaDOS, everything went off the rails. She'd started to think more about things that’s weren’t just, survive the test and get out. No matter how much she'd tried to push them to the side for later. Then again, she supposed it was later now.

So she asked the question.

“Why did Wheatley say you needed me to live?”

She expected anger, outrage or maybe just mocking laughter. What she didn’t expect was for the A.I’s composed, stiff expression to drop the moment she finished asking. Surprised, shocked....She looked....almost frightened and actually stumbled backwards as though physically struck. Apparently she hadn’t heard Wheatley yell that out in the fight.

There was a moment of silence where Chell knew she herself must be looking pretty surprised as well while GLaDOS attempted to compose herself quickly.

“B-because he’s a moron. That’s why. Or he knew I wanted you dead in a more painful....I ..what does it matter what he said? He’s in space and you’re leaving and he was wrong. I don’t need you at all. I was going to kill you remember? If I needed you to live why would I kill you?”

Chell shook her head. She had no idea either, but she had felt like it was important to ask, and that reaction implied....well something that hadn’t been in the picture before. However she was starting to have an idea now.

“I want to see outside. I don’t want to be your disposable test subject anymore.”

“Yes. I know.” GLaDOS was back to holding her arm, fully composed once again.

“But I do have a question.” Chell took a quick moment to decide if this was really the smart thing. It wasn’t. But she never really did have a plan for after escaping and she had no memory, no idea how she got there and no idea of what to do now that her once, would be killer, wasn’t going to kill her.

“What is it?” GLaDOS was watching her with narrow eyes.

“Is Aperture hiring?”

The expression on GLaDOS’ face might not have been worth the entire thing but the ringing silence of the A.I not having an answer for once certainly was.


	17. Epilogue: WTF Are Emotions?

“ _Is Aperture Hiring?”_

It took a solid two and a half minutes for GLaDOS to finally get her voice back. Which might have been a lifetime considering she could think faster then any other person, computer or thing on the planet. She was so stunned she couldn’t even offer any sarcastic comeback or insult.

“What?”

The test sub....Chell throughout the entire conversation seemed to be trying to throw her off balance. One, she had responded after it seemed like she’d descended back into her irritating and now clearly voluntary muteness. She’d even thanked her. Then she had called her by her name. Something no one had done since....well since the scientists; though that wasn’t a name back then as much as a designation. Thirdly, she had brought up something that the moron had apparently said about her. A stupid comment that wasn’t true and made no sense. It had just surprised her that the woman remembered anything from the ranting moron, that was all.

And now this. And to make it worse the woman was now smirking. She clearly knew what she was doing. But that was just as strange. Chell didn’t show emotion, she didn’t respond, no matter how much GLaDOS tried to belittle, insult or even just talk to her. True that had changed a great deal after the moron was put in charge but even then after a few nods, a smirk, a laugh or two and the incident of overheard talking, she tended to keep her expression flat.

Now she looked almost...amused.

“....you just said you didn’t want to be a test subject.” GLaDOS finally responded, not enjoying how her voice still made her sound defensive. This was her facility, she was in control here. “And I just said I wanted you to leave.”

“Not a test subject.” Chell replied. “But I’m sure you could find other work for me here.”

GLaDOS just looked at her.

“You do remember I killed everyone else who worked here, don’t you?”

“So there’s an opening?”

....was that a joke? Had her test subject just made....

Oh no this was too much. She tried again

“And I-"

Chell interrupted. “I’m still going outside and going to look around once I’m up to it.”

“What? Then why don’t you just leave?”

The woman took a moment to respond. “....There might be nothing out there.”

-

To her credit she remained calm but the answer, despite the pause hit something painful inside and she hated the woman just for that. She should have known better then...then what? Well she should have known better that was all.

She kept her face still but looked away.

“Well the answer is no.”

“No?”

“No, we’re not hiring. You’re going to leave here and go bother....deer or something if there aren’t any humans around. Besides I highly doubt you have the qualifications for even the lowest menial position here.”

There was a pause.

“What are you going to do then?”

“What am I?....I’m going to continue testing, what sort of question is that?”

“But you aren’t being forced to anymore.”

Oh was this about....She turned to face the woman again, anger starting to flair up again.

“I told you, I test because I love it. Not because I have to. Yes the whole, need to test feature was a stupid idea and just another way for them to try and control me, but I wanted to do science before they installed that mode.”

She wasn’t sure what the expression she was being met with was, if it was pity then she was going to kill the woman on the spot, strange friendship/whatever or not.

“You don’t have to test all the time I should have said.” Chell calmly replied. “You made yourself a new body. That wasn’t a test. Maybe there are other things you could try out that aren’t testing.”

GLaDOS shot her a look.

“That just shows how little you know about testing. Why do you care what I do anyway?”

Chell then shrugged, her expression was now a calm mask that GLaDOS was starting to wish she could echo better. Making her new form have expressions seemed like an obvious feature when she built it but now she was starting to regret them. Chell meanwhile answered her.

“You saved my life. Twice. You didn’t betray me either when you could have.”

“I told you I wouldn’t.”

“You also lie sometimes.”

GLaDOS folded her arms together, ignoring her own words thrown back at her. “I still don’t see what this has to do with anything. Fine I saved you, even without Caroline being there. You just- ...are probably the closest thing I’ve ever had to a...friend. Even if you are a science ruining monster who won’t leave. Are you happy now?”

Chell looked at her feet for a moment then replied.

“Just so you know....you’re probably the closest thing I’ve ever had to a friend as well.” There was that small smirk again. “Even if you do insult me all the time.”

“I.....” GLaDOS frowned. “I don’t believe you. Humans are stupid, I’m sure there were people idiotic enough to put up with your lack of social skills and numerous other failings.”

Chell looked over at one of the screens behind her. It was footage from a test chamber. She glanced back over at GLaDOS, seemingly just ignoring the insults. But then again she always had. Sometimes GLaDOS wondered why she bothered.

“Do you know anything about my past?”

GLaDOS made an annoyed scoff.

“If you’re asking because of the adoption comments.....then fine, yes I did just make those up. I only have your first name from the records and that’s all. But I don’t see what-”

Chell shook her head. “I don’t remember anything.”

GLaDOS paused. “You what?”

“I don’t remember anything before waking up in Aperture that first time when you started testing me. I don’t remember family or if I had one. I don’t remember where I came from or how I got here. I don’t even remember my last name. Maybe I had a friend in the past, but I don’t have any memory of it. So really you are the closest thing to a friend I have. Only friend I suppose, unless you count my cube, but it’s gone now.”

GLaDOS stepped forward a moment. “Your memory.....and it was the first time you woke up?”

Chell nodded and GLaDOS thought this over, it helped rather then focus on what Chell was saying about the friend thing and she wasn’t even touching that stupid cube comment of hers.

“It ....could be a side effect of the stasis pod. You were the only one who was woken up out of them to test so I don’t know...”

“Maybe. Though I’m fine with it. I just wanted to escape here, survive. I always thought I’d figure out the rest later. Then we got thrown into the future so I suppose it doesn’t matter anyway.”

GLaDOS looked her over for a moment.

“You....are a strange human. That would probably emotionally destroy many of them.”

“Yeah, probably.” The women didn’t seem very concerned.

-

GLaDOS thought it over for a moment. Then shook her head, she’d been distracted. By many things, but really the first answer she’d gotten wasn’t a good enough one.

“You still haven’t said why you really want to stay here. I mean you want basic survival. I suppose that makes sense. But....and while it pains me to have to say this. I’m sure you would be able to survive out there on your own.”

“Maybe.” Chell replied.

“Then why?” Exasperation reached her voice again, she wanted an answer but she wasn’t sure if she did. Nothing was making sense and it was starting to drive her crazy.

“You don’t want me to leave.”

That made her stiffen. “And since when do you know what I want? I would think telling you how much I want you to leave would give you the opposite conclusion, maybe you really are brain-”

“Don’t.” Chell’s voice was suddenly stiff.

“What?” GLaDOS stopped short and noted Chell was looking directly at her.

“That’s what _he_ called me.”

And that made her go cold. It was, wasn’t it. But why would that bother her when....

“So you only get offended by insults from the moron? I suppose mine aren’t good enough then?”

“I didn’t care when he said them.”

GLaDOS just looked at her for a moment. “Then I don’t understand.”

Chell remained silent for long moment. At least this was starting to make the woman just as uncomfortable as it was making her.

However Chell finally spoke up, her voice quieter. “You, aren’t him.”

GLaDOS didn’t know how to respond to that either. She wasn’t him. No, of course she wasn’t. But none of her insults affected Chell like that, why was her using the ones he used suddenly hurtful? Because she wasn’t him? Because using them made Chell think of her as....oh.

Chell looked away again and GLaDOS....she wanted to hit the woman and she wanted...she wasn’t sure what the other want was, the opposite of hitting? Whatever that was, it was there too. Wrapped in a confusing mess of emotions.

“Fine, it’s not like it’s true anyway.” Was her response and while she pretended to ignore the surprised look, she made mental record of it. So back to the real question.

“You want to stay because you think I don’t want you to leave and you think there might be nothing up there and you might die.” Was what she finally came up with.

“I might, I might die down here too.” Chell replied simply. “You might change your mind and kill me.”

“Maybe if you don’t leave.” GLaDOS muttered, but was staring at her hands.

“And I said I want to explore a bit. I want to go outside and see the sky. But...” She shrugged. “I wouldn’t mind coming back if we worked something out, it’s why I suggested the job.”

“I...” GLaDOS trailed off.

“I don’t know why you want me to stay here either really. I was pretty sure you hated me, friendship thing or not. But your robots seem to want me to stay. And...maybe I’m wrong but I was watching you and you suddenly seemed more stiff and formal....angry when I told them I wanted to leave.”

“Do you make a habit of staring at me?” GLaDOS snapped back.

Chell however just nodded. “I figure it’s always safest to keep at least one eye on you when you’re around.”

That...that...she wasn’t sure if she should be angry about that, or....or, well at least Chell was admitting that she was aware of how dangerous she was. That was something. She thought about it for a moment. She did have some plans, and there were only Orange and Blue around to help her with them.

“And if I said yes? Not that I want you to stay because that’s insane, but if I offered you a position here?”

“Then I’d be willing to work out a deal. And no, this isn’t a plan to kill you. No matter what you tell me or yourself, the only reason I killed you was in self defence. If you don’t try to kill me, I will never try to kill you.”

GLaDOS wanted to insist that this wasn’t true and that Chell was clearly just trying to trick her. However she was growing tired of that, and this conversation. The small part of her that was saying, just say yes was starting to add more logic to its arguments rather then just the strange, whatever emotion it was that had made her not like the idea of the woman leaving in the first place.

“A job contract.”

Chell nodded.

“And you swear this isn’t a plan to get revenge?”

“I don’t want to get revenge on you.”

“Fine.”

And she was pleased to see that Chell looked a bit surprised. She had to admit, there was something she liked about this, she wondered what other expressions were hidden under that mask of hers. She realized that a part of her wanted to see them. Perhaps to study, it was the only reason that made sense.

“We’ll discuss the details and write up a contract once you’ve finished healing and I suppose after you go out and look for people.”

“We can do that first.”

GLaDOS paused for a moment. “So you’re saying even if you do find people....”

“I’ll come back.”

“....Why?”

“I want to leave because that’s what I told myself I was going to do. Survive and get out. I didn’t have any plans after that. I just told myself I’d figure it out when I got there.” Chell shrugged. “And now I guess I am there. I don’t remember any other humans, how to act around them, how people live. The ones that might have known me are most likely dead. I don’t remember if I had a job or a house or what I could do out there, even if there’s anything left.”

“So you don’t know anything. If that’s true then why would I want you working here for me?” GLaDOS wasn’t sure what to say so she fell back on insults.

Chell however replied simply. “I know some things. You can teach me the rest.”

“I....” GLaDOS stopped short of insulting the woman again because part of her didn’t think that was terrible, which meant there was something wrong with her. However the side of her that did still have logic working pointed out that Chell learned things quite quickly if you went by testing chamber standards. Perhaps....

She had no idea how this would turn out. Killing the woman was hard for many reasons, it would be safer to just kick her out. But....and she didn’t understand why, perhaps the friendship thing? She didn’t want the woman completely gone from her life. Maybe it was the idea that it would be a waste if Chell went up and found normal humans and just...became like them. She almost shuddered at the thought.

The woman looked at her again and GLaDOS felt slightly uncomfortable as the woman looked her up and down as though searching for something. Did she think she was lying? A thought struck her a second later. Chell kept everything behind a mask. Perhaps she was just as confused as to why she wanted to stay as GLaDOS was about why she didn’t want her to leave.

It was a somewhat comforting thought. Maybe it would clear up when they worked on that contract or when Chell went outside. There was always the chance that they wouldn’t be able to agree on things or that Chell would simply leave and not return. It wasn’t a sure thing yet....it was just an idea. An idea for a test. This was another type of test. She....she could work with that.

“You’ll be on probation first.” She finally spoke up again. “But we can work out those details in the contract. That and where you’ll be staying, how we’ll get food for you and what exactly you’ll be helping me with if you refuse to test.”

Another look of surprise. She was starting to keep a mental tally and she didn’t know why. Statistics perhaps. Things to add to her testing...employee files? It didn’t matter because the woman’s expression changed again and she had to add to create a different tally. Chell smiled and then....stuck out her hand.

GLaDOS looked down at it, she couldn’t really be...however Chell kept her hand out.

Most people would be embarrassed at this point and remove their hand awkwardly. However Chell stubbornly kept her hand out until GLaDOS finally moved closer to the chair and put out her own other hand.

And Chell shook it.

It was....it was odd. She could feel things in this body. All Aperture models had to be able to feel pain so they’d sorted out that issue early on. But this was the first time someone had touched her in a way that wasn’t ripping something off her in well....she had no idea.

It was....well it wasn’t utterly unpleasant.

“I think I can make it back to my room now. I need to rest a bit. My throat hurts from talking so much.” Chell had started to say and GLaDOS was snapped back into reality.

“Yes, try not to wear your voice out. You were insufferable enough with that silent treatment.” And there was something rewarding about being able to hear the woman talk. Maybe because it had turned out that the woman had been keeping silent for some reason, possibly spite and was now choosing to speak to her? She didn’t quite know. Perhaps she just liked proof that she wasn’t being ignored.

Chell got up slowly and then slipped. Before she could even think too much, GLaDOS moved forward to catch the woman. Holding her up by her arm, she was stronger then the former test subject and was able to right her again easily.

Chell however was looking at her, her mask had slipped again, surprise was clearly on her face and that made GLaDOS want to grin. However she settled for a smirk.

“It might be a few more days before you’re able to walk if you keep this up. I suppose I’ll have to help you back to your room so you don’t cripple yourself.”

And Chell laughed. GLaDOS blinked but there was a small smile on her face. She’d made her laugh again, more proof that she was being listened to. It was still surprising but she liked the feeling. She’d made up her mind, she was going to find out how many different expressions this woman was hiding away from her, behind that blank mask she wore.

So she helped the woman back to her room, ignoring the contact. This was normal, with her new body she just wasn’t used to feeling so much. Things had always been a bit faded with the test withdrawal always active, and anyway she was far too high up and inhuman for people to touch often.

There, a perfectly logical answer as to why she felt a bit strange holding the woman. She was getting better at this.

-

She helped Chell sit down at the side of the bed when they got to her makeshift room.

“I suppose I’ll have one of the robots send you some more water. And food, I suppose you humans need that as well.”

Chell nodded and for a moment GLaDOS stood there, not sure what to say but then then turned to leave when she realized she didn’t have to say anything.

Chell however didn’t seem to agree because after a cough she spoke up again.

“Thank you, GLaDOS.”

There it was, her name again. And again it was being used as a real name, not just a designation. Things really were changing.

So she decided as she reached the door to return what she supposed might be the same feeling.

“You’re welcome....Chell.”

And with that she walked out, back to her centre of command where she could figure out what had just happened and what sort of contract she was going to make up for the test...woman....friend....something, who refused to leave her life and she seemed unwilling to kill at the moment.

The future was going to be interesting.


End file.
